


Eye for Eye, Heart for Heart

by darkbluebox



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Magic, Beauty and the Beast Elements, F/F, Vampire Kanaya, gothic horror, sorceress Rose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-15
Updated: 2017-06-30
Packaged: 2018-09-24 18:40:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 28,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9780092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkbluebox/pseuds/darkbluebox
Summary: When you first hear the sharp knocking of knuckles against wood you believe, momentarily, that your mind has finally begun to slip.No human has dared enter your woods in – if memory serves – at least a century, let alone found their way as far as your door.





	1. The Knock

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the bae](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=the+bae).



When you first hear the sharp knocking of knuckles against wood you believe, momentarily, that your mind has finally begun to slip.

 

No human has dared enter your woods in – if memory serves – at least a century, let alone found their way as far as your door.

 

Your senses sharpen, all pointing in one direction, quickly banishing any possibility of imagination or insanity.

 

When the fist echoes of the knock subsides the more subtly beating of a human heart can be heard. It taps away in the owner’s chest, steady, unafraid, as if unaware of its own fragility. You can hear the blood too, thrumming through veins and arteries, pushing energy and life throughout the body.

 

You swallow. It would be wiser by far to allow a servant to answer in your stead. You can hear one of them behind you, the gentle, hollow scrape of metal on metal alerting you to the empty suit or armour’s presence. The dwindling remains of the castle’s magic serve to animate your hollow servants, who in turn serve you. No small irony, considering how this castle and its accompanying magic came into your hands.

 

You do not send one of the suits. A single human is so little threat it’s laughable, and if they possessed any violent intent you would hear it in the pace of their heartbeat.

 

Now, standing before the door, you can smell them too, and you quickly identify your visitor as female, young, foreign. She is accompanied by the scent of a very particular flower, one you fail to identify, yet find to be hauntingly familiar.

 

You open the door.

 

Lightening cracks and tears the sky in two as it hurls an onslaught of rain toward the thick forest below. Anyone without hearing as refined as yours would never have heard her knocking over the thunder.

 

She studies you with deep, startling eyes. Her hood is drawn over her head, yet her silver hair hangs in thick, sodden strands encircling her jawline. She has no bag, nor any other possessions to speak of; only her cloak, a simple dress which would have been elegant were it not soaked, and a pair of practical black boots which clash so deeply you are almost amused. Her gaze is intent, as if she is searching for something within you that you are as yet unaware of. She is the one standing out in the cold and wet; why are you the one fighting the impulse to shiver?

 

You hesitate to guess.

 

“I seek shelter,” she says simply. It sounds closer to an order than to a request.

 

Anyone within a hundred miles knows not to enter your forest, not to go looking for your castle. If this girl has heard the stories about you and yet has come to your door regardless then she is either very brave or very stupid.

 

You choose your words carefully. You have had little cause to speak aloud in some time. “What are your intentions?”

 

She blinks slowly, cat-like, before exhaling through her nose. You feel as though you have displeased her in some way. This notion is as humorous as it is absurd, yet somehow you still feel quite chastised.

 

“My first intentions involve no more than shelter. Perhaps a change of clothes, at a push. Anything beyond that does not make suitable conversation for your doorstep.”

 

Your instincts – which are as strong as they are accurate – tell you to close the door on her. Ultimately, you would be doing her a favour. For once, mind and instinct lie in accordance. Your heart, dead, silent, and unheard from in some time, makes no comment. Whatever force of will causes you to stand back and allow her entry can therefore be in no way due to kindness or compassion. You pray – if prayer is something that creatures such as yourself are capable of – that it may be put down to mere curiosity, or even, sad as it may be, the desire for contact more stimulating than that which you have held for countless decades with empty tin soldiers. The alternative is unsettling. Old, destructive urges you believed you had laid to rest.

 

She steps inside, dress swishing around her legs as pools of rainwater grow at her feet, glistening against the polished marble. You expect her to sail past you in the regal fashion with which she conducts herself even in the face of such undignified circumstances. Instead she stops dead before you and takes a step forward.

 

You assure yourself that she cannot possibly have known her mistake. It’s too much, far too much. You have lived for years in complete isolation, cushioned with silence. The girl stands, eye to eye, gaze intent, studying you as though you were an insect. Every sense is instantly overloaded. Her heart, still steady, hammers drum-like in the air around you which feels as though it is vibrating with it. Her skin is so pale, a stunning contrast to your own, and at such proximity you can find every freckle sprinkled across her cheeks and nose, examine her long, fluttering eyelashes, the familiar violet hues of her irises.

 

But the true engulfment stems from the flowery scent surrounding you, swamping your mind in a light haze, but then, beneath, there’s the thick hot rush of life, pushing, pulling, throbbing, beating. She’s bright and burning and so alive you feel as though you are looking into the sun.

 

A poor choice in image. Such an action would destroy you. Or then, perhaps, accurate. This girl drips with destruction, and for the first time you consider the extent to which she may truly pose a threat.

 

She blinks, and a bundle of muscles and nerves within you which you had not known were wound unravel into nothingness.

 

“A guard will show you to guest quarters,” you say steadily, eyes remaining locked to hers. “A change of clothes will arrive shortly.”

 

She smiles and steps back. Your shoulders relax as she leaves your space, a detail which you doubt escapes her. “Good.”

 

It isn’t an expression of gratitude. It’s as if she is making a point of withholding thanks. As if she thinks it is undeserved, or that she is somehow entitled to your hospitality. Your guest is impossible to know, a trait which you should not find as alluring as you do. You would call her peculiar were it not for the hypocrisy of such a statement.

 

She doesn’t bat an eyelid at the disembodied suits of armour, nor does her pulse as much as stutter. Again, the word “peculiar” springs to your mind.

 

Your guards follow your wishes without the need for verbal direction. One – and only one, for you have no desire yet for her to feel frogmarched or otherwise under guard – leads her toward the grand entrance-hall staircase while another departs in search of a suitable change of clothes from your wardrobe.

 

A third heads in the direction of your preferred study, where it will light a fire in the ornate fireplace, which has, prior to this evening, been used for little beyond aesthetic purposes.

 

Your eyes follow the stranger as she ascends, taking the lead from the guard, although how she can possibly know the way is another question to add to your expanding collection. In times gone by visitors to the castle were entranced by the stunning architecture, the high arches and intricate decorations. You remember admiring them yourself when you first arrived, but even the beauty of the castle did not distract you from your purpose for long. The only feature to earn a second glance from your guest is the grand portrait at the top of the stairs, which she pauses to study.

 

Any number of the peculiar gothic artworks displayed throughout your abode could give you cause for discomfort, although the unsettlement lingering around this piece in particular is of no mystery to you.

 

The castle’s previous owner looms over you, her portrait hauntingly life-like. The cut of her jawline looks sharp enough to kill, her deep dark eyes glittering with the unmistakable power of a sorceress of old. For many years you kept the painting in the West Wing along with all else you would rather not see or think about. More recently, you returned her to her place above the entrance hall steps. Perhaps as a subconscious reminder, or a warning. You were not eager to examine the impulse.

 

For a second you look from the portrait to your guest and back, and – blonde hair, dark eyes, harsh jawline - you can see no difference between them. Your guest turns, her eyes locking onto yours, and a heady, supernatural calm slides over you. The connection dissolves like spirals of steam rising from a hot drink before dissipating into nothing.

 

You do not identify until sometime later the feeling of enchantment as it envelops through you. But by then, it will be too late.

 

The glance is only momentary, and she turns away to vanish from sight. You stay put, attentively listening to the rhythm of her footsteps until they reach their destination, and only then do you allow your attention to turn to other things.

 

You wonder if any food may be found in what remains of the kitchen gardens. Unlikely, but all the same you mentally assign yet another guard to the task, and feel a reflex-like jerk yank at the connection in your mind to confirm that your wishes have been heard.

 

You retreat to your study and await your visitor, anticipation warm and anxious in your stomach.

 

Whoever, whatever this girl is – if she expects to harm you, beat you, best you – she has a surprise in store.

 

Vampires do not make for easy prey.       


	2. The Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She's more dangerous than she seems, and it could be your undoing.

She takes her time coming to find you, as if finding amusement in keeping you waiting. In many ways you find this to be a relief. You use the intermission to collect your thoughts, studying one of the suits of armour as it arranges several thick logs in the fireplace before you. A burst of flame billows outwards, and you shield your eyes, mouth turning down in distaste. The room melts into a soup of flickering orange which chases the shadows into the corners. You push your headscarf, now too stuffy to wear with any comfort, down and around your neck, sparing a moment to reshape your hair.

 

“I must say, I’m a little disappointed.” She watches you from the doorway with a glint in her eyes. “Many of the stories claimed you had horns.”

 

You turn away from the fire to meet her gaze. Your senses are momentarily confused, before you realise that the exchange of her clothes for yours has muddled her scent with your own. Nonetheless the simple emerald petticoat frames her well, and your eyes linger for a second longer than they should. “Stories?”

 

“Indeed. But we shall come to that later.” She joins you before the fire, casting an eye around the room. You watch as her lips mouth the titles of the novels you keep above on the mantelpiece – a few of your most treasured tomes, enough so that you keep them here instead of the library – before her eyes dart to the armchair, beside which sits an antique chess set. “You play?”

 

Your lips quirk. “I’ve never had the head for it. Besides, the guards make for poor opponents.”

 

“I see.” She picks up the black queen and studies it. “Yet you keep it here. For aesthetic purposes?”

 

You do not reply. She turns away, hand balling around the piece, and looks into the fire.

 

“I imagine you have questions. I must admit I didn’t expect I would have to prompt you for them. Should I put it down to patience or disinterest?”

 

“Neither.” You find your voice. “Why are you here?”

 

She raises an eyebrow. “It didn’t occur to you to begin with my name?”

 

“You criticise my lack of questioning and then you criticise my method?” you retort.

 

She laughs. The sound light and clear like bells, and she tilts her head back as she does so, exposing the long pale expanse of her neck. “Not as demure as you appear, are you?”

 

“Certainly not. But have it your way. Kanaya Maryam, at your service.” You extend your hand. “Although I suspect this is not news to you.”

 

She takes it, expression enigmatic. “Rose. A pleasure.” Her hand is warm, grip firm but careful. Something in her name tugs at the back of your mind like a warning, one which you ignore.

 

You tilt your head at the lack of family name, which earns you another gentle laugh. “That’s all you’re getting.”

 

“I am no sorceress. I have no use for a full name.”

 

“I’m sure. But I suspect that lying to you would be entirely futile. So if I do not wish you to know something, I will simply remain silent, as is now the case.”

 

You shiver. She is right. Any variation in the steady beat of her heart would not escape your ears. You find such intimate knowledge of your abilities, your body to be perhaps her most unsettling admittance yet. But perhaps unsettling you was her purpose – a glance into the dark eyes studying you intently, not smirking, precisely, but certainly entertained – heightens your suspicions.

 

You narrow your eyes, noting the chess piece still being rolled back and forth between her fingers. You realise that the entire conversation thus far has been a series of moves in a game you didn’t know you were playing. You would feel cheated but for the fact that you doubt there are any rules to this by which to be cheated.

 

She’s still watching you with the same faint amusement, as though she is observing your every thought flicker before her.

 

Irritation surges, and when you realise that even this frustration may have been by her design, it surges further. “Then, your purpose here. If you would be so kind.”

 

She smiles. “May I sit?”

 

You nod curtly. She arranges herself in your armchair, curling her legs up and leaning an elbow on the arm. “There is no small amount of literature about this castle. Its history. Its owners, past and present.” Her eyes scan you up and down. “Some of it undeniably pure fantasy. Yet some of it rooted in truth. I’m curious.”

 

“You wish to study me?” you ask. “If you have read as much about me as you imply, you would know this to be less than wise.”

 

She ignores your warning. “You _will_ accommodate me.” It is not a request.

 

You raise an eyebrow. It is far too tempting to rise in response to her cheek, even when you know this would likely be her desired outcome. “Will I, now?”

 

“Yes. And no harm will come to me while I stay.”

 

“Perhaps your stories were less informative than I believed.” You take a step forward. She rises to meet you, eyes blazing, and once again you are placed far closer to her than you are comfortable with.

 

“I am well aware of your reputation. _All_ of it. The people of this valley remember that which you took from them. And I am no fool.” Her eyes flicker to your mouth. “Know that my mistreatment would, in no uncertain terms, be your undoing.”

 

It’s laughable. This human stands before you, small, weak, vulnerable, painfully mortal. She stands there and _threatens you_. Most ridiculous of all is that, striking deep in your gut where only instinct lives, you are… afraid. Your mind and your instincts forsake their alliance, as, flying in the face of all reason, intuition tells you that this girl could tear you apart without laying a finger on you. More likely than not before you even realised she had done so.

 

“And if I were simply to turn you away?”

 

“Do you want to?” she sits once more.

 

“I do not.” You don’t bother hiding the fact. If she knows the stories she will have drawn her own conclusions as to why. You see little point in correcting her. As nefarious as she may believe your motivations to be, you can’t say with total certainty that she’s wrong. Try as you might, purity of intention lies beyond your reach.    

 

For the first time, her heart rate quickens. She can tell from the tilt to your head that you have noticed. She turns her head away, disguising the moment by resting her chin on her hand. You do not pounce on the moment as you know she would, were your places reversed. You turn as well, knowing that the sight of your triumphant smirk would weaken your stance upon the high ground you have created for yourself.

 

A cord jerks in your mind. The guard assigned to sourcing a meal from your extensive gardens has had some degree of success.

 

“I assume you have not eaten,” you say, breaking the momentary silence. “I have had preparations made.”

 

She turns back to face you, returning the black queen to its place as she stands. “And will you be joining me?”

 

“In eating? No.” You smile, and her eyes catch on your canines, far sharper than those to which humans are accustomed. “We both know well enough that your palate and mine differ quite significantly.” Her eyes follow you to the door, which you hold open for her. “But, if it is not to your objection, I may sit with you.”

 

“It is not.”   
  
You walk to the dining hall with her, where your sources tell you an improvised stew illuminated by candlelight awaits, ingredients scavenged from what remains of the kitchen gardens. The worst of the storm has abated, yet rain still strikes the stained glass windows as you follow the hallway to your destination.

 

When you feel Rose’s arm link through yours, your whole body tenses.

 

She smiles up at you with a fondness you find suspicious.

 

You mark it down to another move in her ridiculous game, the aim of which you have yet to discern.

 

You still have many questions, and the duration of a meal in which you have the time to ask them.

 

Her arm is warm against yours, and you can feel her pulse as it thrums below the surface of her skin.

 

No. Even after a century of starvation, you do not plan on eating tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah Rose is so mysterious and dramatic honestly
> 
> Next week: the villain arrives... or is she already here?


	3. The Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Your dreams are not your own, and neither is your heart.

Dinner is not as enlightening as you had hoped it would be. Rose takes pleasure in sidestepping and evading your every inquiry, skipping conversational circles around you so easily she could be dancing. You should be infuriated, but instead her every subtle taunt is fuel to the sparks of curiosity catching within you.

 

She eats, requests that you send the chef her compliments (you both laugh) and retires to the guest quarters. It is not particularly late, and you speculate upon what mischief she will undoubtedly occupy herself with before sleep takes her.

 

You, of course, do not sleep. You would never waste precious hours of darkness in such a manner.

 

You do, however, meditate. In recent years you have found it invaluable in relaxing and centring your mind, perhaps to the extent that you struggle to make it from night to night without this mental reprieve.

 

You suspect that the castle may be in part responsible for your dependency. Too much untethered energy circulating through its ancient halls and passages has its effects, the most prominent of these being certain…visions. Visions that are easier by far to handle through allocating a daily period of time in which you can empty your mind and allow them to have their way with you. It’s safer than the alternative.

 

They’re little more than dreams. Probably.

 

You would usually save your meditation for the height of day, but once you hear Rose’s heartbeat slow with unconsciousness in the distance you reconsider. You have no idea what the coming day (days?) may hold for you. You would rather begin your next interaction with your guest with a clear and focused mind, as far as such traits are possible in her presence.

 

You assign a guard to monitor her – not to confine her to her room, but to alert you immediately should she leave it. When you retreat to your quarters the steady beat of her heart drops out of your hearing range, and for the first time this evening you can relax, free from the constant itching awareness of her presence.

 

Your quarters remain as you left them, the only part of the castle which feels truly lived in – even if “lived” may not quite be the correct term. You have adorned every surface with great drapes and reals of cloth, creating a patchwork collage of colour throughout your rooms. A single dim candlestick drips wax onto your dresser, which also holds several glass bottles and jewellery boxes. You spare a glance for the looking-glass which hangs over it, the peeling silver frame decorated with intricate twisting vines. The glass, which has long displayed a deep black crack through the middle, shows you nothing but an empty room.

 

You flop into your pile of assorted pillows and dressings, wriggling yourself into a hollow before removing your headscarf from your shoulders and smoothing it out across your lap. You lean your head back and close your eyes, the image of your guest swimming before your eyes for a moment before vanishing. You have other apparitions to attend to, ones which will not be kept waiting. A century has passed and she has yet to master the art of patience.

 

 You refuse to describe the castle as haunted. In the traditional sense, and therefore as far as you are concerned, it is not. You are not haunted by the ghost of a long-ago murdered sorceress, of that you are sure. These are simply the scattered remains of her presence, the shards and fragments of her life that escaped destruction. An ordinary human death was apparently beneath her.

 

At the same time, you are not sure what you will do when the last of the fragments disperse.

 

You open your eyes and find yourself instantly blinded.  

 

The snow is painfully bright and in the split second before you screw your eyes shut your burning eyes pick out the familiar steep slopes to the south of your castle. Your body may still be curled up in your quarters, but your mind is now wandering the snow-drenched valley of another time. You find yourself on your knees, the cold biting your legs and fingertips. You try to stand but your legs wobble and give out beneath you, and you roll onto your side, gasping. Shielding your eyes in the nook of your arm, you let out a high-pitched whine.

 

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Her voice trickles into your skull like syrup.

 

“It _hurts_.” No matter how hard you press your arm over your eyes you still feel it, the after-image scorched onto your retinas still flashing agonisingly in your mind. “Please, it _hurts_.”

 

“Of course it does. Why else would we be here?” You can hear the curve of her smile as she shapes each word, and it seeps through you like ice. “Look.”

 

You shake your head, shoulders quivering. Her voice comes from no direction in particular, or perhaps _every_ direction, but as you turn your head from side to side it’s impossible to tell until you feel the ghost of her breath at your left ear.

 

“Listen.”

 

Further off, perhaps a little way down the slope, you hear laughter. Children.

 

“This is not my memory,” you hiss through your teeth, which are starting to chatter.

 

“I do wish you would look. They’re so happy.”

 

“No,” you whimper. “No.”

 

“Why not? Perhaps then you might recognise them.” The children’s voices grow louder, whooping and shouting as they run to and fro. A girl screams, high-pitched in mock terror, before descending into giggles. From the distance, back in the direction of the castle – the kitchen gardens perhaps – you hear a woman’s voice calling them in. The laughter cuts off.

 

Her hand smooths across your cheek, as cold as the snow, gentle. You hear footsteps trudging up the hill, hearts still racing from their game but now driven only by the promise of a hot meal indoors. The hand slides up to your arm and latches around your wrist. Her voice cuts through the air like ice. “ _LOOK AT THEM.”_

 

She wrenches your arm from your eyes and you scream.

 

You blink in the blissfully dim light of your quarters, believing for a second that all is well. Tonight’s vision was admittedly rather vicious, even by her standards, but nothing you cannot handle.

 

Then it hits you.

 

It isn’t a vision. It has nothing to do with it. This is something else, something terribly, terribly wrong.

 

A searing pain tears through your chest as though someone has thrust their hand inside and crushed it around your heart. The scream that had just died in your throat is resurrected, although at this stage you can manage little more than a yowl as the clenching agony pulls the strength from your vocal chords. You convulse, yanking a long silk shawl upon the other end of which rests the foot of your dresser. The dresser jolts and the candlestick wobbles, casting a bizarre array of flickering shadows across the room. For a split second you see the impossible: a figure leaning over you. Her features are hard to distinguish in the wavering shadows but you catch a glimpse of narrowed eyes and curled lips, and for a moment you even feel the press of a hand against your burning chest. You cry out, although in that moment it sounds more like two cries than one. The woman screws her eyes up in pain, staggering away from you as though you have burned her, and you squeeze your eyes shut too.

 

When you open them again the room is empty.

 

You climb unsteadily to your feet, leaning one hand against the dresser as you wait for the trembling of your hands to cease.

 

Something is still out of place, and your hands refuse to settle no matter how you try to calm yourself. It is not until the dancing shadows return to their places and your mind catches up to you once more that you realise what it is.

 

The heartbeat is fast, panicked, pushing the blood from place to place as if terrified it’s going to be cut off at any moment. It’s loud, vibrating in your ears and your bones and your chest, oh God, and your chest. That shouldn’t be there. That _can’t_ be there.

 

Within your ancient, long-dead body, a living human heart is beating.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, I'll explain!!
> 
> Coming up next week: A lot of flirting, probably. Rose is shameless.


	4. The Tour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You learn to see what once was hidden.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rose,,,,,,pls I know she is pretty but,,,,,,can u maybe,,,,,, chill,,,,,,

Your skin itches as though you have outgrown it, and now it’s stretched tight over your body, impossible to be comfortable in. The sensation has given you a new restlessness that leaves you unable to keep yourself still for longer than a few seconds.

 

Your guards tell you, not with words but with hazy visions in your mind, the same story over and over. Rose spent the whole night in her quarters, silent, making no movement until she emerged the following morning.

 

You had expected as much. The appearance in your quarters had likely been as much of an illusion as the winter landscape, although the precise meaning of it you have yet to discern.

 

The steady push and thump of the heart in your chest, however, is no illusion. It pulses through your body, setting you on edge and filling you with a shaking, living energy which no amount of restlessness will subdue.

 

It’s terrifying, it’s unnatural, it’s inexplicable. Worst of all, you have no idea what to do about it. You're not alive again, by any means - there's no impulse to breathe, to sleep, to feed, no desire for the half a dozen little mannerisms and behaviours characteristic of human existence. It's a living heart inhabiting a dead body. It shouldn't be possible, yet it is. 

 

When Rose taps you on your shoulder your brand-new heartbeat stutters for a moment.

 

You turn to find her standing, as is her habit, far closer than you would like. You realise that with the infuriating thudding echoing in your ears the sound of Rose’s own heartbeat is lost to you. You narrow your eyes in irritation, wondering what else your hearing may have let slip.

 

“Such a displeased expression upon encountering my visage can very easily lead to the wrong impression, if I may presume it to be wrong.”

 

“You may.” You smooth out your expression into one of polite interest.

 

“In that case.” She links her arm through yours, as is her apparent habit. Your first instinct is to wrench it away, terrified that she will detect the pulse under your skin. But you reconsider. After all, her arrival and this development may not be coincidental. She may, despite her apparent alibi, already know more than she is letting on. Besides, human senses are nowhere near as sensitive as yours. “I believe it is time for my tour.”

 

“Your tour?” You tilt your head to the side, smiling faintly.

 

“Of the castle, of course!” Her smile dazzles you, almost as bright as your snow-white visions. But even so, you detect unease beneath it which was not there before. The girl who has been unfaltering in her self-confidence since her arrival has been somehow unsettled. You narrow your eyes once more, sending her a message: _your unease is noted_.

 

A breath shivers past her lips, but she does not respond. She leads you by the arm to the foot of the staircase.

 

“We shall begin here. Spare no detail.”

 

 You graciously oblige. You lead her down long corridors, weaving between pottering guards as they sweep floors and dust off the various marble busts and sculptures scattered throughout. You show her the galleries, the ballroom, the gardens, the terraces, the towers, the north wing, the south wing, even the dungeons.

 

The last place sends goosebumps up and down her bared arms and she shivers, wrapping them in against her stomach.

 

“I had not taken the cold into account,” you say, distraught.

 

“It’s fine,” she replies distractedly, her eyes lingering on the rows of long-deserted cells embedded in the castle’s rocky foundations. You unwrap your headscarf from your neck and unfold it before pulling it over her shoulders. She smiles briefly as you arrange the material around her arms like a shawl. You tug the ends together across her chest, unintentionally pulling her into you. She does not meet your eyes, but neither does she step away.

 

“I had hoped that, if not being of sufficient historical interest, these catacombs may have at least aligned with your fascination with the macabre. But instead I have made you uncomfortable.”

 

“I did not say I was uncomfortable.” Her head is on level with the crook of your neck, as if she were on the verge of laying it to rest there. You imagine how that would feel, soft hair tickling your chin, warm skin against cold. You swallow as her voice continues, close enough that you can feel its vibrations at your clavicle. “And at what point did I express a fascination with the macabre?”

 

“Well.” You smile, fangs digging into your bottom lip. “You’re here with me, are you not?”

 

“True.” Her eyes are following the stretch of skin from your shoulder up to your earlobe, tracing the pale criss-crossing of scar tissue etched into your skin. “But there are bad memories here.” She reaches up, fingers tracing the patterns across your neck. You shudder under the touch, take her arm in your hand, and she stops, hand resting against your skin. But you do not pull her away, and after a moment she resumes.

 

“Bad memories,” you whisper.

 

“Pain. Misery. Torture. As would be expected, of course.” You can’t tell if she is talking about your dungeons or you. Then two of her fingers press in against your artery, and her eyes widen in a mirror of yours.

 

Your pulse stutters, and you know she felt it.

 

“You speak of this castle’s history, yet you never speak of your own.” She draws her hand away as if nothing were wrong.

 

“You already know it.”

 

“You overestimate me. You overestimate my resources.”

 

“Do I?” You raise an eyebrow.

 

“Besides.” She pulls your scarf tight around her shoulders. “You would have a unique perspective, would you not? Being the one who actually lived it.”

 

“Perhaps.” An impossible breeze tangles through your hair for a moment before vanishing. It is said that the tunnels which lead away into the mountain sooner or later come out on the other side – not that anyone who has ever attempted escape through such paths lived to tell the tale. Aside from endless dead-ends and looping tunnels, ancient booby-traps still in operation, the rumours of hauntings were enough by far to keep any unlucky prisoners in their cells. “But this is not the place for it.”

 

“Agreed.” She shivers again, and you place a hand on her back, turning her away and back in the direction of the narrow stone steps from which you descended.

 

Luckily, you have saved the best for last.  You lead Rose away from the dungeons and through several more corridors and passages, by which time the warmth has returned to Rose’s skin. At last you arrive at a pair of ornate double doors, which you open with no small degree of flourish.

 

Rose’s eyes widen, lips parting into a soft _oh_.

 

“You like it?” You smile. For the first time, you have rendered her speechless.

 

The library has always been your deepest love, and Rose’s reaction reminds you of your own the first time you entered it. So many years on and you have yet to read even a fraction of the books contained within its walls.

 

Rose enters the room in a daze, standing in the centre and spinning, neck craned back to gaze upwards until the shelves meet the ceiling high above. Golden balconies wind around the walls while ladders reach where hands cannot. Leather-bound tomes litter every surface, ancient works in every language imaginable. Of all the rooms to have grown dusty and neglected over the years, you have never allowed this to be one of them. Sunlight glows through thick red drapes, not enough to cause you discomfort but enough to bathe you both in warm pink.

 

Her continued wonder warms you to the bone, and as her eyes light up with an inferno of delight you feel within you similar flames licking into life. She takes your face in her hands and laughs, loud and clear and achingly beautiful.

 

“This is… This is…!” She gestures wordlessly.

 

“Any book in this room is at your disposal for the duration of your stay.”

 

You think for a moment she may kiss you. You can imagine very easily her arms around you, her smell, her taste.

 

You step away, smile dropping from your face.

 

She notices, eyebrows drawing together in worry. “What’s wrong?”

 

“Nothing. If it pleases you, I must step away for some time. But you may stay here for as long as you like.” She reaches for you, but you are too quick, and before she can object you dart from the room, bile rising in your throat as a thousand repressed memories claw their way back into the light.

 

You spend the afternoon in your rooms, shoulders heaving as you try to force your body to relax. But, curse this ridiculous living heart, the hammering of your pulse in your ears never slows, never stops.

 

The hands which clamp down on your shoulders are of little help. You feel the press of her thumbs into your back, nails digging into your skin in painful half-circles.

 

You aren’t even meditating, yet still she has found you. It’s concerning, how corporal she feels. The illusion has not held this much power in a long, long time.

 

“But you make it so easy, my dear Kanaya,” her voice purrs in response to your thoughts. “The guilt, the memories, the pain. Your mind is a shining beacon and I? I am the hunter in the night.” You feel her shift her weight behind you. You _imagine_ you feel it.

 

“How much longer must I bear this?” you answer through gritted teeth. “How much longer must I suffer?”

 

“For what you’ve done?” She laughs. “Eternity wouldn’t be enough. But in answer to your question: not for much longer.”

 

Her words bring you no sense of relief, no promise of escape. Only a deep sense of foreboding. “Meaning?”

 

“Meaning.” She pauses, presses her lips to a spot below your earlobe, soft as silk. “Meaning that soon, all this will be over. You’ll be finished.”

 

Your eyes slide closed. You shiver, so cold you could be back on that snowy slope. “You’re lying. You are an apparition. Less than that. You can do nothing to me.”

 

“And yet,” she laughs, “and yet I already have! You’re being undone before your very eyes. And you cannot even see it. Yes, by my doing, at last you will be _destroyed_.”

 

You twist around, eyes blazing. Deep purple eyes blaze back before dissolving into nothing with a cold laugh, and a hazy, magical mist rolls back from your mind like a receding tide. You remember why you found Rose’s appearance so familiar. What impossible magic stopped you from seeing it sooner?

 

The dead sorceress, the mysterious visitor. Why, they could be one and the same.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gf: is anyone dead in this fic  
> me: define "dead"
> 
> Coming up next week: drama (tm)


	5. The Turning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You have no idea what she can do to you.

_The vampire who killed you had been so kind at first._

_Deep blue eyes, sparkling sapphire and cold as ice. You had fallen in an instant, and your heart stopped long before she truly killed you._

_You were so young. A lonely, poor girl in a lonely, cruel world, all your family dead and without a penny to your name, and so unaccustomed to having anyone care about you. Even if it was all pretence._

_The beautiful girl with the missing eye and the iron arm had taken you in, fed you, cared for you for a while. Then she tore your throat open and left you for dead._

_Clearest of all you remember nails sharp like claws scraping across your skin, teeth ripping into you._

_When you tried to scream she clamped her remaining hand down over your mouth, leaning in to whisper with laughter deep in her throat, “There’s no need to be like that, is there? We’re just playing fair, aren’t we? I fed you, now you feed me.” Then, even quieter, almost sympathetic, “Just relax. Enjoy it. Enjoy the rush.” You bit down on her hand, hard enough to tear through flesh, and she shrieked. She yanked her hand away, brought it back to crush your windpipe. Screaming was no longer an option;_ breathing _was no longer an option. The thick stench of blood had filled the air with a warm, metallic tang as it blossomed across your clothes, your skin. You saw it smeared around her lips, staining her teeth when she smiled._

_When she tore in the second time you no longer had enough air left in your lungs for as much as a whimper. For a moment your entire mind whited out with the pain, an absolute blankness as your body buckled and writhed._

_But her weight pressing into you held you in place, and you would have begged, sobbed, said anything, done anything, but the cracking desperation in your lungs –_

_\- and if she noticed the tears trailing across your cheek she didn’t say anything, and underneath the pain you felt something else, the life being pulled from your body, the strength sapped from your muscles, the energy pulled from your limbs. Something else was seeping in in its place, something thick, heavy, black –_

_\- and suddenly you threw your head back and feel it smack against something, hard, but you were beyond caring. Eyes blown wide, your body convulsed –_

_\- and you died. It didn’t go as you imagined, but as if someone had flicked a switch. Heartbeat one moment, none the next._

_She let you go, and you slumped to the ground like a ragdoll._

_“Huh. Dead but not departed. That doesn’t happen often.” She straightened, dusted off her clothes, and smeared the blood staining her lips away with her sleeve. “You’re tougher than you look.” Her eyes twinkled, impressed, as though you had passed some test._

_“What – what have you done?” you rasped, voice cracking. Your eyes are still bleary and wet, and you couldn’t lift as much as a finger if your life depended on it. “I can’t – I can’t move!”_

_She threw back her head and laughed, long, dark locks falling back over her shoulders. “Oh, my beautiful Kanaya. You have_ no _idea.”_

_Vriska Serket left you, dead and paralysed in a pool of your own blood, and you never saw her again…_

 

You find Rose in the library, an ancient, cracked manuscript spread around her as she sits, cross-legged like a child, in the centre of the room. Her eyes are rimmed red, head bent so her hair splits to fall over her shoulders in two neat streams, leaving a neat V shape framing the nape of her neck.   

 

You grab the arm she’s using to wipe her eyes and you use it to yank her to her feet.

 

“I didn’t mean to – I just found it by accident, I wasn’t – I’m sorry…” Her stream of apologies trails off when she realises your mood bears no relation to whatever personal documents she has uncovered.

 

You yank her towards the doors, out into the corridor, your nails digging into her skin. Your expression must be quite an image, because she takes one look at it and bites down on her lip, silent as you pull her down flights of stairs and around corners until you find yourselves surrounded by the high walls and pillars of the entrance hall.

 

You turn to face the great portrait mounted on the wall above, hand still gripping Rose’s arm. Her eyes follow yours to the woman glowering down upon the pair of you.

 

“You have her eyes.” you say, voice low. “You have her _everything_. What are you, her granddaughter? Great-granddaughter?”

 

“You shouldn’t be able to see the resemblance. You shouldn’t have noticed.”

 

You pull her in towards you. “You used _magic_ on me.”

 

Her gaze hardens, as if everything behind her eyes had fallen flat. It’s like watching a village closing all the shutters before a storm. “Of course I did. You would have recognised me immediately without an adjustment to your senses.”

 

“A sorceress like her, of course,” you spit. “What else did you do? What else did you do to me?!”

 

She shakes her head. “I didn’t-!”

 

You drop her arm like it’s burning you and step back, raising a shaking hand to your temple. “Everything I’ve thought about you, everything I’ve felt about you. _You_ did this to me!”

 

Her eyebrows crease. “Did what?”

 

“No more games,” you snap. “No more, Rose _Lalonde_.”

 

Her full name echoes through the hall, and the tingling at the base of your spine infuriates you. It’s an illusion, _her_ illusion. Her name matches the one inscribed on the gilded frame encircling the woman from whom she must be descended through who knows how many generations, matches like the violet eyes and silver hair and cutting jawline.

 

A shaky breath escapes Rose’s lips. “Stop it.”

 

“I don’t know your story, but I know you cannot remain here. I cannot allow…” You scramble through the chaotic cacophony of your thoughts all voicing their panic. “I don’t know what you want with or from me but it certainly goes beyond mere academic interest. Nonetheless I have no intention of giving anything to a descendant of…” You choke on your words.

 

“…of the woman you murdered?” She arches an eyebrow.

 

“I do not think you know myself or my history as well as you think you do.” In your mind you call out to your guards, feel them jerking in response, homing in on the pair of you as though you are a burning beacon.

 

“I know my own. And that of my family.” Her eyes blaze. “I know what you did to them.”

 

“So you wish for the same fate?”

 

“Was that a threat?”

 

The guards appear in unison from different directions, blocking every arch and doorway except one, light glinting upon the semi-circle symbol melded into each of their breastplates. “Take this as your invitation to leave,” you say, shaking. “Any further prompting will not be so polite.”

 

She tilts her head to one side. If the arrival of the guards bothers her, she gives no indication of it. “But you know who I am. Why not kill me? Or worse. I may have certain talents, but if it came down to a real fight I have no idea what would happen. I’m almost curious.”

 

You hiss through your teeth. “You _goad_ me.” You can feel your heart hammering in your chest at a million miles a minute, adrenaline thumping through you, and if you had any reflection to examine you would find your pupils dilated to animalistic proportions. Every nerve and muscle in your body is straining and pulling you on. And she’s _encouraging_ you to-

 

Under your orders, the guards take a step forward. The single clank of metal on marble bounces around the room. Rose doesn’t even blink. You clench your fists. “ _Leave_.”

 

“No,” she replies levelly. The guards take another step. She continues to gaze steadily at you, and they take another.

 

A moment longer and you tell them to draw their swords. The slide of steel draws her eyes for a moment before they meet yours once more. A few more steps and the guards are forming a perfect circle around you both save for the gap allowing passage to the front doors. Swords on level with her neck, they move you both towards the door, and Rose steps back in unison with them, eyes still on you. “You don’t understand. I cannot leave.” The guards part around you as they continue to force her back. The glint of steel so close to the exposed skin of her neck causes you to advert your eyes.

 

“You will.” Your heart hammers in your chest as though fearing for its life. The guards follow the fractured, panicked instructions of your mind and push forward once more. Rose’s back hits the door.

 

Rose grits her teeth and closes her eyes. “No.” She opens them, and now they’re not just violet but glowing. The air shimmers around her and an impossible gust of wind tangles her dress around her ankles. “I WON’T.”

 

You tell your soldiers to strike. Not to kill, but to knock her out. You’ll make one of them carry her to the nearest village and leave her there. Leave the rest to keep a perimeter and ensure she does not return.

 

Your plan is a good one, but before you can act you discover within it a serious flaw.

 

The guards do not move.

 

You frown, shake your head, mentally grasp for the invisible strings connecting you to your servants. You find nothing. _Attack_ , you think.

 

They do not react. Then, like marionettes with their strings cut, the arms holding out swords fall limp.

 

“What…?”

 

Rose smiles grimly. “You didn’t think they might obey me over you?”

 

The guards, as one, turn towards you. The semi-circle rune on each of their chests which for so long had served as proof of their enchantment to you flickers purple. The guards raise their swords as they step forward.

 

The last thing you remember seeing is the glowing indigo of her eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yikes


	6. The Tale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Your past is hers, and hers is yours.

_“I can help you.”_

_She finds you perhaps two months post-mortem, in a back-alley between a rank, reeking tavern and several blocks of slum housing so horrifically infested it had been long abandoned to the vermin and to the dead. The thick stench of the tavern is clogging all your senses, alcohol and sweat hanging heavy in the air as the rumblings of hoarse laughter and shouts hum from within, punctuated at regular intervals with glass smashing and women screaming. You wonder how you ever lived among these vile creatures, lived as one of them._

_“I can help you,” the woman repeats. You’re slumped boneless against the wall, shrouded in blood-stained rags, rotting with the filth and waste of the humid city. You had thought the life of a peasant girl was hard, but in truth you started at the bottom and dug downwards from there. Dug down into the filth, dug your way to hell. She, by comparison, could be royalty. Long, black silk framing the curve of her hips, beautiful gold jewellery flashing around her neck and wrists. Someone of her status has no business in such shady parts of the city._

_“Nobody can help me.”_

_She smiles with fanged teeth. From her headscarf, which is a similar deep green to your own, a few curls of dark hair escape. You narrow your eyes as you listen, and realise with a bubble of something between panic and surprise that she, too, lacks a heartbeat._

_She holds out a hand. You can see the black tendrils of a tattoo curling around her wrists, heading upwards and vanishing under her robes._

_You look at what remains of the man who was foolish enough to attack you lying by your side. He’s slumped in on himself, rats already burrowing through the folds of his clothes. When the barmaid next opened the back door to slosh more refuse into the street you intended to be found with him. Intended to be taken away, stopped, removed, tidied away and thrown out like the leftovers of those rich enough to have food to waste._

_You have nothing left to lose. You take her hand, cold tears sliding down your face._

_“It’s okay.” She wraps an arm around you, and you wince, thinking of the blood and filth ruining her finery. “It’s okay.”_

_She feels warm and strong beside you. For the first time in your life or death, you wonder if you may at last be safe._

You open your eyes in the castle dungeons. Every bone in your body aches and groans as you push yourself upright, blinking in the gloom.

 

A stale breath of air sifts through your hair. You reach out and test the cell bars before you. The door rattles, but does not give. The guard on the other side stands motionless.

 

“Let me out.”

 

It doesn’t respond. You shiver. You had come to think of the servants you had taken as extensions of yourself, appendages throughout the castle and its grounds that you commanded in the same way you would an arm or leg. Now your connection has been snipped like the thinnest of threads, and you know who holds the scissors. She’s likely watching you at this very moment through the eyes of your – her – tin puppet.

 

Leaving the guard for the time being, you scan your cell. It’s the same as any other – a pathetic, rubble-strewn hollow carved into the chalky mountain rock, without as much as a bed to rest on. You can feel bruises forming along your spine where jagged rocks pushed into your skin. You sigh and close your eyes, mind still spinning.   

You had believed the last of the Lalonde lineage to have died at your own hands. Rose’s very existence is a mystery to you, as much as her reasons for not having killed you. She has every reason to do so.

 

Perhaps it has something to do with the power she likely has used to sway you to her whim. With a cold heart you revisit every flutter, every touch, every warm feeling and inexplicable benevolence you have bestowed upon her. Only sorcery could explain it; what else could possibly have you behaving like a naïve and love-struck fool? 

 

Of course. Killing you was to be only part of the game, the final checkmate. First she wanted to destroy you in other, more brutal ways.

 

The first flickers of candlelight begin to creep down the corridor towards you, accompanied by the echoes of footsteps on stone.

 

Your pupils contract as Rose steps into view, and you raise a hand against the bright burning candlestick she carries.

She sets it down on the stone before you, just out of reach. The bars cast long, finger-like shadows across the cell, painting flickering black stripes over your skin.

 

Rose’s shoulders are rounded, her expression weary. You put her fatigue down to pretence and immediately banish it from your mind. “I can assure you that none of this was my intention.”

 

You send her a pointed frown and push yourself backwards until you meet the wall. You cross your arms over your chest as you draw your knees in against you.

 

“Really. I had no other choice in the matter, and acted in both of our best interests.”

 

You raise your eyebrows. Deeper in the labyrinth you can hear rats scurrying, the distant drip of muddy water.

 

Rose sighs heavily. “Must you insist on this sulky behaviour? It’s childish.”

 

The snort escapes before you can stop it. “You locked me in a dungeon. In _my_ dungeon.”

 

“If it’s semantics you want to get into, I will point out that I carry as much claim to these dungeons, no, to this castle, as you, if not more. The guards stand as a testament to that.”

 

You let out a harsh bark of laughter, and hear it bounce off the walls a few times before fading. “Is that why you’re here? To gloat? To think that I had imagined you above such things.”

 

“No.” Another pained look, so pained you almost fall for it. “That isn’t why I’m here.”

 

“Then?”

 

She bites her lip. “As much as it pains me to admit it, I need your help.”

 

This time the laughter starts slowly, building up until you’re near _cackling_ with it, body shaking as you wipe tears from your eyes. “Of everything you’ve said to me,” you snort, “that has to be the most entertaining by far! Oh, please, elaborate!”

 

She shakes her head. “I’m serious.”

 

“I don’t doubt it.” You choke down on the last of your giggles. “Please, Rose Lalonde, great and mighty sorceress, commander of guards, keeper of castle, vanquisher of vampires, do tell me. How may I be of service?”

 

She closes her eyes. “I have quite the story to tell.”

 

“Then tell it.”

 

With heavy eyes, rounded shoulders and a dark expression, she begins.

 

_Once upon a time, in the deepest and most remote regions of the Southern mountains, stood a bright and beautiful castle. For many generations this castle had been home to one family, passed from mother to daughter along with the name, the trade, and the powers and duties which accompanied it. They were a proud, noble family, famed throughout the land for their bravery and cunning in vanquishing any threat which faced the people and their rulers. But it was in dealing with one particular threat that they gained the most fame._

_The first vampires arrived by sea, hidden away on cruise ships like vermin, but less easily killed. They struck fear into the heart of the kingdom, quickly making a name for themselves as a terrible and powerful force._

_But the Lalonde family matched their power with ease. It fell to the head of the house, the first but not the last of the family to take the name Rose, to spearhead the attacks._

_Alongside her cousins, she destroyed countless vampires, drove them to the brink of extinction across the land. It became her obsession. Her life._

_The last known vampire in the country was said to live in solitude, a peaceful existence in the depths of a forest miles from the nearest village._

_After years of searching, of preparing, of obsessing, Rose hunted her down and slaughtered her without a moment’s hesitation._

_She would not discover until sometime later the existence of Porrim Maryam’s adopted sister._

_She returned to her castle and to her family, living in peace and prosperity and, for a short time, free of the inheritance which had consumed her, instead devoting her energies to raising and preparing the next generation of Lalondes for the duties that would fall to them._

_All but one of those children were to die before this could occur._

Rose pauses, raises an eyebrow. “I imagine you know most of this already.”

 

“All of the children but one,” you say pensively. “I didn’t know that. I suppose I can blame sorcery for obscuring your shared name in addition to the physical similarities?”

 

“Yes.” She studies you. “Although I’m still not sure how you broke the spell keeping you from recognising me in the first place. But I digress.” She tilts her head to one side. “Perhaps you wish to recount the next part?”

 

Words suddenly taste bitter in your mouth. “Still looking for my _unique perspective_?”

 

Her lips quirk in amusement. “Something like that.”

 

You close your eyes, bow your head, and continue Rose’s tale.

 

_You find the remains of Porrim Maryam lying on the kitchen floor with her chest ripped apart, the white bone of her exposed ribcage startlingly bright against the deep red. Her empty eyes stare into you, wide and afraid. The only sound is the steady drip as her blood trickles onto the cold stone tiles. It’s smeared across her hands and clothes, the signs of her struggle against her assailant. She never stood a chance._

_The firewood in your arms, carried in from the frost-dusted log pile outside, tumbles to the floor, bits of twig and branch bouncing and rolling away. You had been gone no more than five minutes._

 

_You can smell the human who was here, the faint lavender traces so fresh you must have missed her by a matter of seconds. What if you hadn’t? Could you have saved the women who rescued you from the streets and took you across the sea, who found a peaceful life for the pair of you and treated you like family?_

_No. You would have ended up dead on the floor alongside her._

_You bury your sister with a hole in her chest where her dead heart once rested._

_You don’t bother to pack; none of the utensils and furnishings of the cottage by the lake hold any meaning to you now. Before they had symbolised a new life, starting over in a far-away country once unaccustomed to the presence of your kind and therefore less likely to bother you. So far away from any humans that you felt safe enough to leave the door unlocked at night, or half-open while stepping out for firewood. But that safety, like your brief peace, had been torn apart, and so you leave the saucepans, the tea towels, the purple rug and the ornaments on the mantelpiece to gather dust in that forgotten corner of the woods._

_You wrap up warm, even though you doubt the cold in your bones will ever leave you again, and you lose yourself in the wilderness._

You have turned yourself away from Rose, because you can bear her seeing you cry no more than you can bear the pity in her eyes. You don’t deserve it.

 

An impossible wind whips through the dungeons, snuffling out the candlelight. The pair of you are plunged into darkness as the draught echoes around you like the whispers of an invisible audience.

 

“Kanaya.” Rose’s voice is tight, panicked. “Kanaya!”

 

“What’s happening?” Kanaya turns. Rose is on her knees, hands out in front of her. It’s not too dark for you to make her out, but for her weaker human vision it must be like wearing a blindfold. “Is this sorcery?”

 

“Yes,” she says, and it sounds close to a sob. “Yes, but it’s not mine! You have to stop her, you have to get away, you have to-!”

 

Purple light floods the dungeons. You curl in on yourself with a shriek as the light burns into you, and by the time it’s dim enough for you to look up again, someone else is standing in her place. It may be Rose’s body, but the woman behind those eyes is not the one you were speaking with moments ago.

 

Rose Lalonde Senior, killer of vampires and long-dead sorcerer, smirks down at you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy 4/13!


	7. The Posession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Power lies in unexpected places.

The sorceress holds her stolen hands out before her, turning them over, smirking as her skin emits a faint, pulsating glow. You push yourself back, pressing yourself into the corner like a frightened animal. Rose – that is, Rose the second – had told you to run, as if that were an option while you were trapped behind these bars.

 

“What a lovely body. So young, so much like my own. So very beautiful.” She glances over at you and smiles wickedly. “You noticed too.”

 

No words come to you, which is no small problem, because it strikes you that your survival over the course of the next few minutes may depend upon your ability to talk her into doing anything but attacking you. The small part of your mind left unaffected by shock or panic is calculating furiously, compiling everything you know or remember about this woman that could help you.

 

Fact one: she dedicated her life to tracking down things like you and killing them. Not helpful.

 

Fact two: following her death, for which you were responsible, sorcery-related misdemeanours have allowed fractions of her soul to have their way with your mind, tormenting you at every opportunity. This fact you find more helpful; if your pain and fear is her entertainment it may buy you time.

 

Fact three: a surge of power which you blame on her descendant’s presence has allowed her to possess Rose’s body and re-enter the corporeal world. This fact is both obvious and completely useless unless you can find a way of putting Rose back in control.

 

“H-Hello again,” you say. It’s the only response you can come up with. You almost add _Rose_ to the end, but thanks to sharing it with her descendant this name is no longer practical. You’ll call her Lalonde.

 

She – Lalonde - sighs. “Well, that’s just disappointing.” She snaps her fingers and the bars of your cell melt away before you, pooling into thick black puddles which sizzle on the stone. Before she can make a move you lunge forwards, hoping to take her surprise, but she sidesteps you easily, grabbing you by the arm and slamming you into the opposite wall.

 

A sharp crack vibrates through your body as pain tears through your ribcage and sears across your cheek where the bare rock face scraped your skin open. You blink flecks of blood from your left eye in time to see Lalonde’s hand as it takes your chin, pinching it between thumb and forefinger. She studies you as though you’re the livestock and she’s the butcher.

 

“Rose,” you say in a voice that cracks, praying that she’s still able to hear you.

 

“I can’t tell if you’re talking to me or not.” Her light tone stands in jarring contrast with her actions as she grabs you by your hair and slams your head back against the wall behind you. You slump down with a pained cry, limbs falling limp as your vision begins to shimmer and double up and the world spins around you. You were stronger than this once, a very long time ago, but a century alone to stagnate has weakened you immeasurably, and even at your full strength you were never a match for her. She tilts her head to one side, studying your reaction. You swing your fist weakly in the direction of her head, but the waves of dizziness still washing over you send your fist far from its target. She laughs, knocks your hand away, and, as though punishing you for your pathetic resistance, reaches forward and wraps her hand around your throat, pinning you back against the wall. Breathing hasn’t been a necessity to you in some time, but nonetheless the crushing pressure on your windpipe causes a high whine to whistle through your teeth. Your hands fly to clamp down on her wrist of their own accord.

 

“I wasn’t talking to you,” you spit. She retorts by squeezing your neck tighter, long nails digging into your skin until you feel a thin trickle of blood down your neck. “I want nothing to do with you!”

 

“You could have fooled me! Turning up on my doorstep with those scared eyes, pretending to be so cold and alone and afraid. Hidden in plain sight, the last vampire!” Her hand relinquishes its grip and she hurls you to the floor. You try for a kick, but she responds by stamping down on your hand, hard. You feel bones crack, the sound lost to your cry of pain. “You gained our trust, the love and care of myself and my family. Then you snuck into our rooms in the dead of night and killed us all, all save one. Did you lose count? Did you forget how many you had murdered in your frenzy? I remember.” She twists your foot and grinds your fingers under the ball of her foot. “One little girl hiding under her bed was all it took. Lalondes are like ivy. You can try to chop us down, but there’ll always be more tendrils to find their way to the light. And bless my young Rose, she has done _so_ well. Returning to the home of a great-grandmother she never knew, following all the little dreams I sent her way. But now it’s _my turn_.”

 

“You planned this. You made her come here.” Your voice is little more than a wheeze, the pain of her hand crushing your neck still an aching after-image.

 

She smiles. “I think you have overstayed your welcome, dear Kanaya.” She snaps her fingers. The guard, which has stood motionless until now, takes a step forward and unsheathes its sword. “I have looked forward to this for a very long time.”

 

You feel the kill order zip through the air from her mind to the guard. You flinch, heartbeat quick and light like the fluttering of a moth’s wings. In your last moment you wonder, somewhat futilely, whether your Rose can see what’s happening, whether she would want to stop it. It’s a sad thought.

 

But it’s not your last moment. You open your eyes, which you hadn’t realised had squeezed shut, and see the sword still hanging stationary over your chest.

 

Lalonde frowns, and once again you feel the command jump through the air. The guard begins to rattle as if being pulled in two directions at once, the symbol of two semi-circles on its breastplate glowing and flickering like a candle in the wind. The sword slips through its grasp and clatters to the ground beside you, slicing the sleeve of your robes open and exposing the deep brown expanse of your arm, which is covered in goosebumps you can’t explain.

 

“ _Do it!_ ” she barks, but instead the suit of armour falls apart with a deafening clatter. Pieces of metal fly off into the darkness, rattling as they roll away. Several rats squeak in alarm and the breastplate symbol’s glow flickers out.  

 

In all your time commanding them you’ve never seen anything like it, but that’s not what’s on your mind. What’s on your mind is the sword in your hand.

 

She’s too distracted by the mound of metal parts that was once a suit of armour to see the hilt of the sword smash against her head. She reals backwards but doesn’t collapse, hand coming up to clutch at her temple. A whimper that sounds terrifyingly weak and human escapes her lips, and you think of Rose. There’s no time to check the damage you caused. Every part of you has been battered and bruised, but your legs can still carry you. You turn and run without looking back, up the stairs and away, your heart hammering in time with your footsteps.

 

For a moment, you believe you have a chance. Then you find the rest of the guards.

 

They’re encircling the dungeon entrance, shoulder to shoulder and standing ready to attack. The slick slide of metal on metal cuts through the air as they draw their swords in terrifying unison.

 

The legs that moments ago saved your life give out beneath you. You never had any chance against her, and your escape was as futile as your resistance. You can only pray that, now she’s had her fun, she’ll finish it quickly.

 

You don’t hear Lalonde’s footsteps as she approaches from behind, but you shudder when she places her hand on your shoulder. The touch is surprisingly gentle, and it’s strange to think that this is the same hand that slammed you between wall and floor, left those deep purple bruises around your neck. A tear rolls down your cheek and is lost amongst the blood and filth already smeared across it.  Your eyes slide shut.

 

Her voice breaks the silence, cold, victorious. “Now it’s-”

 

Metal slides on metal. A loud thump. The hand falls from your shoulder.

 

When you turn, Rose Lalonde – the first, the second, both, whichever – is lying in a heap on the marble tiles.

 

The guard which stood closest to her lowers its fist.

 

“You… knocked her unconscious?”

 

It turns to face you, and for a moment you feel as though it is staring right through you. Then it stands to attention once more as though it had never moved.

 

You turn your attention back to the body. Her chest continues to rise and fall steadily, but all the same, you press two fingers to her neck to double-check. You frown, try the other side of her neck, and then her wrist.

 

Leaning over her, you press your ear to her chest and listen. Silence.

 

Rose Lalonde, living, breathing, otherwise healthy human, doesn’t have a heartbeat. And you, a long-dead vampire in a lifeless body… you do.

 

She took your dead heart and replaced it with hers. A heart for a heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can u tell I like to end my chaps with dramatic reveals


	8. The Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Together or apart, you cannot protect her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy six months, Rosemary

She’s a warm, light weight in your arms as you carry her to her quarters. Her room is a mess of various texts liberated from your study and strewn over the bed and floor, as well as several you don’t recognise - you cannot fathom as to how she acquired them. Her bed remains unmade, but all the same you lay her there to rest, pulling the sheets up and over her shoulders.

 

There’s a ring of purple around her eye where the guard knocked her out, and if you could see her irises the colour would be an exact match. You brush a lock of hair back and behind her ear, fingers brushing over her cheek, soft as silk and dusted with freckles. The darkness has left her, for the most part. You can feel it swirling in the air around you instead, pressing down at the top of your spine. Malicious. Nonetheless, when she awakes, you are confident it will be your Rose once more. She will have some explaining to do.

 

The prickling _presence_ of the woman trying to kill you is uncomfortable to the point that you find yourself unwilling to leave Rose alone. The guards remain unresponsive to your orders, so you make do with what you find in her rooms, pulling an armchair over to her bedside and cleaning the dirt from the gashes across your face and arms with a borrowed washcloth. Every movement sends pain needling through your ribcage, and you estimate that you have broken two, maybe three ribs. You suspect that your fingers may hold yet more fractured bones, but for the moment they’re too swollen and bruised for you to be sure. For the moment they hang at your side, inoperable, while your weaker hand takes on the tricky task of picking dirt and dust out of your wounds.

 

Outside the sky has turned dark, the wind howling as it whistles through the cracks in the ancient stone walls. You don’t know how long you were unconscious, if it’s late or early, if it’s been a day or more. Your eyelids droop as though pulled down by weights and the compulsion to let your head fall back and your mind slip away trickles through you like honey. But you can’t, mustn’t. Not now you know that the fragments of Lalonde’s mind are not as aimless or benign as you had believed. One instance of possession has been quite enough for the time being.       

 

The magic enveloping you stirs, displeased. After a few minutes of goosebumps prickling your skin as you silently battle for consciousness, you feel it slide away. Beside you, Rose shudders in her sleep, likely falling victim herself to the visions you refused to entertain.

 

After a few minutes she shudders again, mutters protests in a tight voice. You pull the covers up from where they have slid down her shoulders and tuck her in tightly, the best apology you can manage for whatever her slumbering mind is being subjected to. You know well that waking her would be a mistake: once the visions have begun it’s usually safest to let them play themselves out, like waiting for an overexcited child to exhaust itself until it falls asleep of its own accord.

 

Several more unconscious mutterings punctuate the following minutes. You imagine Rose, standing tall with righteous indignation, arguing furiously with a fragment of her ancestor for _daring_ to violate her mind. A smile tugs at the corners of your lips.

 

_…all the little dreams I sent her way…_

The smile melts away like snow before fire. Perhaps, like you, Rose has been coping with these visions for a very long time. Perhaps the quiet whimpers beginning to slip past her lips are as much a part of her nightly routine as the moon and stars.

 

A low whine tears you from your thoughts. Unable to stand it, you reach out and caress her cheek with your uninjured hand, once again smoothing locks of hair back behind her ear. You never imagined you would find something so soft and fragile in all the world, least of all within someone so hard and strong. Rose is a beautiful mess of surprises and contradictions. Every moment in her presence tears you apart a little more, the sheer impossibility of it all. She’s the stake in your chest, and every movement, every action nudges it in a little further, tears you open a little further. It’s a slow, burning agony.

 

She reaches out for your arm and grabs it, and for a moment you think she has awoken, but her eyes remain shut despite the surprising strength of her grip. Her hand slides up past the rags of your torn-open sleeve to your shoulder and applies pressure, trying to pull you in. Her touch is like fire against your skin. The hand is the same one that had wrapped around your throat, and there’s still blood beneath the fingernails. You know that wasn’t Rose in control at the time, but you flinch all the same. The gentle yet insistent press of her hand on your shoulder continues, and against your better judgement you give in to it. It’s too easy to slide from the armchair to the bedside, wincing as you do so as your aching ribcage sends you a painful reminder of your injuries. She pulls you onto your side and you bring up your legs until you’re lying alongside her. You can feel her breath ghosting across your skin, and the beautiful scent of lavender is almost overwhelming. Your eyes flicker past her neck but refuse to linger there.

 

You used to kill humans without a second thought. You had known of no other way, thought it necessary to your survival. No worse than killing the mindless chickens you had kept in the yard during your sad, short life to drive back the desperate hunger which never seemed to truly leave you.

 

Then you met your sister, the pacifist, so wise, an ancient vampire with wisdom in her words and love in her heart who showed you a better way. The pair of you had been happy to live a secluded, peaceful life.

 

After her death you had destroyed your abstinence in the most horrific fashion. Not out of the usual type of hunger, but out of a new kind. The hunger for vengeance.

 

Even without the vicious hauntings from your most infamous victim, you would have felt guilt beyond measure. After all this time you find yourself no more likely to receive forgiveness from yourself than from Lalonde herself. Destruction at the hands of her descendant would be fitting, no, fair. But the press of Rose’s arm as it circles your waste, the tickling warmth of her hair under your chin as she nuzzles into your chest… You cannot imagine a murderer hidden within her frame. No, not even after her ancestor’s interferences. Lalonde may have sent Rose to destroy you, but you cannot imagine your end at Rose’s hands. No, no, it could only be Lalonde’s.

 

Either way, you are comforted by the thought that your last moments may be spent looking into Rose’s eyes.

 

She shakes again, lets out a soft sob. You pull her in against you, the salty dampness around her eyes seeping through your robes. You find yourself closing your eyes, unable to keep the tremor from your lips. You’re as scared for her as you are for yourself. She didn’t deserve to be caught up in this feud between ancient nemeses. She could have led a peaceful, sheltered life far from your dungeons and dangers and death.  

 

You stay this way for a long time, running your fingers absent-mindedly through her hair as your eyes stay fixed ahead, thinking.

 

 You are startled from your thoughts when Rose punches you in the gut.

 

You tumble out of bed with a shriek and land on the floor with a thud. You look up to see Rose peering over the side of the bed, eyes wide.

 

You push yourself upright, rubbing your head. “You punched me?”

 

“I,” she begins, falters, licks her lips. “I wasn’t expecting to wake up in such…circumstances?”

 

You blush. “I was…” You cannot find any reasonable explanation for your actions.

 

“It wasn’t a complaint.” Her blush is more noticeable than yours, starting at the tips of her ears and spreading across her cheeks and nose. Your heart flips.

 

“Are you hurt?” you ask as you climb back up, perching yourself on the bed alongside her. You take her head to examine the bruise underlining her eye.

 

She shakes her head, more out of incredulity than by way of an answer. “How can you ask me that? Look at yourself.” She takes your injured hand by the wrist, careful to avoid the purpling skin, but all the same you wince. The lattice of scratches along your face and the half-moon fingernail imprints dotted along your neck amongst splotches of bruised skin must paint quite a picture. She swallows. “I never imagined…” She’s shaking as she turns your hand over. “I never imagined she would go this far.”

 

You raise an eyebrow. She exhales slowly. “Well. I knew she _wanted_ to. But I thought I was stronger. I was wrong, and you paid the price.” You shake your head but she continues nonetheless. “I’ve been dreaming of you all my life. But every time, even as a child, I have never been myself but her. I was doing terrible things to you, saying terrible things. It was only when I was old enough for my mother to tell me about the history of our family that it began to make sense. I began to understand that they weren’t my dreams, but someone else’s.”

 

“All your life…” You trail off, your mouth dry. You think of every encounter you have had with Lalonde over the past few decades. None would have been pleasant for a child, even one watching through Lalonde’s eyes. “…and once you heard the stories?”

 

She eyes you warily. “I won’t say it didn’t lend a certain perspective. Perhaps that was what made the allure of my namesake, this castle, you… strong enough to pull me here.” She looks away. “My betrothal was the final straw.”

 

“Your-?!” You draw back, but she catches your arm, halting you.

 

“One family can only live on its fame for so many generations.” She rubs her thumb back and forth over your skin without making eye-contact. “The truth is that we have no other choice; what money our ancestors passed onto us has dwindled to nothing. They’re a good family in search of someone of a good name, and would keep myself and my mother in comfort. It’s that or destitution. But I had thought that there could be another way…”

 

“You planned to retake your family’s castle. Removing me from it in the process.”

 

Rose’s hand drops away from your arm and curls up in her lap. “As I said. I thought I was stronger. But you were… unexpected.”

 

You gaze steadily at her, yet still she refuses to meet your eyes. “Unexpected.”

 

“I found you far more sympathetic a character than initially expected.” Her eyes flicker up to your lips at last. “You were… kind.” You blush, look away. “I found manuscripts in the library before you came to find me. I can only assume they were your own writings, details of your early life, your hardships. How you came to be here. Once I had more of your story I knew I couldn’t possibly…”

 

It’s raining outside, and you can heard the fat, heavy drops bouncing off the windowpane above.

 

“When she took control of my body I was more afraid than I care to admit.” She reaches up to you, fingers sliding across the skin of your neck, smoothing across your cheek and up until they reach the hem of your headscarf, catching in a few loose locks of hair which have slipped from beneath it. “Watching her hurt you, it was…” Her voice cracks.

 

“It was nothing,” you say quietly. The look she gives you is troubled as her hand slips around until she’s cupping the nape of your neck, fingers tapping nervously at the top of your spine. You wonder if she’s thinking the same thing you are, and your eyes drop to her lips. Then you remember her fiancée, and you pull back, not missing the brief disappointment which flashes across her features. Your eyes catch on the bruise around her eye once more. “You used the guards against her.”

 

Rose smiles bitterly. “I’m afraid I may have done the first guard some irreparable damage in the mental struggle. Luckily, a sharp blow to the head was enough to put an end to it.”

 

“For the time being.” You watch droplets of water chasing each other down the outside of the windowpane above. “I believe we are right back where we started.”

 

Her brow creases. “Your meaning?”

 

You force yourself to meet your eyes. “Neither of us are safe while you remain here. So once again I must demand that you leave.”

 

Her lower lip trembles but she holds your gaze. “I understand. But unfortunately, there is something I cannot leave without.”

 

“What might that be?” you ask. She leans in, and once again you are struck by the thought of her lips pressing against yours. Instead she presses her hand against your chest, warm against you. You both fall still, listening to the fluttering heartbeat under your breastbone.

 

Rose’s eyes close as she listens. “I believe this belongs to me.”

 

You mirror her position, placing your uninjured hand against her chest. Still nothing. “I did wonder. Care to explain?”

 

She lets out a steady breath. “The incident in the dungeons was not her first attempt on your life. The night I arrived here, she took over me, tried to use me to perform a very dangerous spell. One that would have ripped your heart from your chest and destroyed you, had she succeeded. But it was only partially effective. I took your heart. It’s right here, inside me. The only problem is that I gave mine in return.”

 

You blink, removing your hand from her to chest to place it over your own. You are neither as horrified nor as surprised as you should be. In some ways it feels fitting. “I see.”

 

“But the spell was only possible due to a degree of proximity – say, the distance from one end of the castle to the other – and so if either of us breaches this – well, I have no idea what would happen. But the likelihood of us both surviving it would be low.”

 

“Can you reverse it?”

 

Her gaze drops down as she draws her hand away. “I don’t know.”

 

You listen to the vulnerable flutter of her heart where your own should be. It expands and contracts painfully in your chest, and you imagine you can feel the tingle of sorcery surrounding it, reaching back to its owner and keeping her alive despite the dead heart in her chest.

 

“Then there’s only one option left.” You clench your jaw, casting your gaze around the room. You have lived in this castle for decades on end, yet entered this room, like the majority of them, on no more than a handful of occasions. For the most part you let the castle rot, gather dust as the decades passed like a tomb dedicated to those you killed. At its very core, the languishing remains of a tortured sole that has fed off your regrets for long enough. As appropriate a tomb may be for someone like yourself, it is no place for the living. No place for Rose. “We both leave.”

 

Rose’s eyebrows slide upwards. “And go where?”

 

You look to the window. It remains too dark to see any more than the press of darkness against the glass. It has been so long since you saw the world beyond the valley. You doubt the world has become any more tolerant to your kind over the years, and any existence within it would rely upon Rose’s protection. Your life in her hands.

 

You think you could bear it. “Anywhere.”

 

She smiles and takes your hand in hers. “We leave at dusk.”

 

Lightning splits the sky outside. The castle creeks, as if reminding you of its presence. The hair on the back of your neck stands on end.

 

You are struck by the certainty that the two of you are not alone in these quarters.

 

If Lalonde is listening, she stays quiet. For the time being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rose's mom: you have to marry some rich dude  
> Rose's lesbian ass: YEET


	9. The Kiss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hearts collide and fall apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting while watching Eurovision assassinate my country.

Much to your relief, the guards have not moved from the corridor linking to the dungeon stairs. Were they to move, you could no longer be sure who was telling them to do so, whether or not you would have to fear for your safety. It feels strange that the empty suits you saw as your own for so long are now so distant from you, so threatening. You have surprisingly little to do in the way of preparation for your departure, and so the day passes slowly. The sun is low and the shadows long when you seek Rose out in her quarters. The novels and knitting works are gone, yet still she carries no bag, nor any other apparent means of transporting her belongings. You shake your head, adjusting the small leather bag hanging by your hip. Most of the objects within are of little value beyond that of personal interest: a spare headscarf, a couple pendants and bangles which remind you of your sister, two of your favourite books from your study. A single, sturdy hunting knife as a precautionary measure. Last of all, taken on impulse just as you turned to leave your study and close the door behind you, the white and black queens from your chessboard. They clink together in your bag as you take your place at Rose’s side. She’s popping blackberries into her mouth absent-mindedly as she tugs at the bedsheets, which somehow end up in even more of a mess than when she started. You don’t mention that it was a pointless exercise anyway. “Where did you get those berries?”

 

“Your gardens are mobbed in brambles, and I was peckish,” she says simply, trying to smooth out the folds in the fabric and failing. You wrinkle your nose.

 

“You shouldn’t have been wandering around outside on your own.”

 

“I’m perfectly capable, Kanaya.” She takes your arm and smiles. “Ready to go?”

 

You glance to the window and nod. The rain hasn’t halted, but has at least lightened. The ancient dirt tracks leading through the forests will be muddy, but not impassable.

 

A few minutes later, you’re standing at the doorway, pulling your old travel cloak around your neck. You struggle with the ties as they slip through your stiff, bruised fingers, until Rose takes them from you and pulls them into an elegant bow. “You’re sure you’re well enough to travel?”

 

You smile. “I’m perfectly capable, Rose.”

 

She laughs, light and pure, her eyes sparkling. She smooths her hands over her shoulders before pulling the hood up and over your head. “Ready?”

 

You nod, slipping one arm through hers and using the other to heave the massive entrance doors open. The patter of rain on cobblestones whispers in your ears as you look ahead of you into the darkening woods. You take a breath and step into the rain.

 

Everything around you plunges into darkness.

 

You hear Rose scream, but the sound is distant. It echoes as though you have been plunged into a deep tunnel, or dropped down a well. There’s no ground beneath your feet, and when you throw your arms out in panic you cannot see them before you. You are buffeted by a hot, silent wind and your sense of balance tips and spins as though you are inside a tornado.

 

“Kanaya!” Rose’s voice bounces and echoes around you with no discernible source, high and afraid. You yell out her name in reply, but you feel your words being swallowed by the wind and the dark. You try again, this time in a wordless scream. A hand comes out of nowhere, grabbing you and pulling you in. You wrap your arms around her like a drowning man gripping onto a raft. Your eyes remain useless as the pair of you wrap your arms around each other. Rose’s forehead presses against yours, her words chocking out in a sob.

 

“She’s trying to stop us from leaving – I can’t stop her – It’s – Kanaya, it’s agony!”

 

“You have to beat her.” You take her head in your hands as if you’re trying to force your own strength into her by sheer willpower. “You’re strong, Rose.”

 

Her hair tickles your hands as the wind of the void whips it this way and that. She grips your shoulders, fingers intertwining with the fabric of your scarf. Your vision is suddenly flooded with blinding purple light. You shriek, try to push yourself away, but Rose’s grip is inescapable. Realising your struggle is futile, you instead launch yourself forwards, pressing your eyes into the crook of her neck to protect them, your teeth grinding into a wince. Rose is shaking violently and you can feel the light burning through the thin silk of your scarf into the back of your neck. The void fills for a moment with a deafening roar before Rose is ripped from your arms.

 

You land in the mud with a splat. Pain tears through your ribcage and you roll onto your side with a wince. The rain cools your face as you blink up at the coal-grey sky above. Arms trembling, you push yourself upright and scan the land around you. A damp blur of brown and green landscape, amidst which the grey castle looms, its long shadow engulfing you and reaching as far as the treeline ahead. Rose is nowhere to be seen.   

 

“Rose?” you call out. The wind whispers through the trees and rain patters, but you hear no reply. “Rose?” Your voice grows louder, more panicked. You pull yourself to your feet, your travel cloak heavy and caked in mud. “Rose!”

 

For a moment the landscape twists and shimmers, sending a wave of nausea through you. There’s a thump, and Rose lands at the foot or the stone steps.

 

You stagger over, calling out to her as you do so. She’s coughing as though she’s about to bring up her lungs, and when she turns her head towards you there’s a thin rivulet of blood trickling from her nose. Her eyes are unfocused as you take her head in your hands once more.

 

She gives you a wonky smile. “Easy.”

 

You plant a kiss on her forehead before you can think better of it and her eyes widen for a moment. Then she slumps forwards in your arms, unconscious.

 

“Oh,” you say to the descending silence. “Out again.”

 

You giggle for a moment, loud, hysterical, then you, too, collapse.

 

When you wake, you know without opening your eyes that some time has passed. You feel the inexplicable itching at the back of your neck telling you of the sun’s rise, and you bolt upright, panicking.

 

You’re back in Rose’s quarters, tucked up in her bed. Rose herself is curled up at your midriff, her head resting on your stomach and one arm curled around your waist. Your cloaks hang together on the door hook, a murky brown puddle beneath them. Most of your outer layers of clothing have been removed and hang on a clothes horse in front of the fireplace, the headscarf around your shoulders having been carefully replaced by the spare you had packed. The curtains are drawn, yet the beginnings of daybreak are beginning to creep through them, casting a faint, dreamy light across the bed. You groan, wriggle, and tug the covers upwards over your head. Rose shifts, nuzzling the soft curve of your skin above your hip, and a giggle slips past your lips.

 

You feel her eyelashes brushing your skin where your undershirt has ridden up as her eyes flicker open. “What was that?”

 

You tense, blushing.

 

She pokes you in the side, and you twitch. “You’re ticklish,” she announces matter-of-factly.

 

“No,” you lie. She pokes you again, and a splutter slips past your lips. Rose giggles in delight, fingers probing the strip of flesh bellow your bellybutton, and you shriek. You roll away from her and tumble out of the bed in a tangle of sheets. Rose sits up, smoothing out her petticoat, and you flush and shield your eyes. “You’re – I’m – we’re - I didn’t realise!”

 

“You’re too bashful. This is hardly inappropriate.”

 

You pull the sheets up and wrap them around yourself like a robe, frowning at her as she continues to giggle. You turn your nose up haughtily. “Such state of undress is perhaps acceptable to you, but amongst those of us belonging to more civilised society…!”

 

She gasps in mock-outrage. She grabs the end of the sheet still lying on the bed and yanks it, pulling you back in. You tumble forward, one arm landing on her shoulder to support yourself and the other holding up the sheet still wrapped around your chest.

 

“Rose,” you try, but she’s still giggling. “Rose, we have serious matters to discuss. Our failed departure-!”

 

“Later, later, it’s far too early.” She leans forward, her hand sliding from your arm up to your shoulder. “Besides, I beat her back for the time being. I beat her back! God, Kanaya, it was exhilarating.”

 

“That place, that void, the magic-!”

 

“Later, later.” Her eyes flicker up and down you, and your skin prickles, not uncomfortably, with heat. “Sunset will come again. We have hours ahead of us.”

 

“Rose,” you insist. “Please.”

 

“Kanaya.” Her hand slides to your neck. Her eyes flicker down. She leans and she kisses you.

 

For a moment it’s like sinking into a warm bath; hot enough that you feel you may be dissolving, every muscle unwinding and relaxing as you unravel between her fingers. She tastes so smooth, sweet like peaches and honey. For a moment you give into it, let her reach inside you and pull everything apart. She may have taken your heart, but now you know for certain that it’s really hers. For a moment.

 

You jerk back. The expression on your face wipes the smile from her face, and her eyes widen as yours harden.

 

“No,” you say simply. The word tastes fowl in your mouth, so bitter in comparison to that which you had just tasted. Rose’s eyes follow you, heavy, hurt, as you grab your garments from the clothes horse and leave without another word.

 

Her heart hammers in your chest.   

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god this upd8 is so late I'm sorry  
> These losers need to stop misreading each other
> 
> Coming up next: a deal with the devil


	10. The Bargain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You may sacrifice one queen to save another.  
> But will she play by the rules?

You stand in the doorway, arms crossed, studying the treeline ahead of you. Even in the safety of the shadows you can feel the sunlight scratching at your skin, but the irritation doesn’t sway your eyes from the treeline as your fingers tap out a nervous rhythm against your arm.

 

“What’s wrong?” Rose’s voice startles you but you don’t turn around. Nor do you turn when you hear her descending the entrance hall steps to join you at your side.  “It’s too early to try leaving again.”

 

“Look ahead. To the edge of the woods.”

 

She frowns. “I don’t see anything.”

 

You shake your head, remembering her pitiful human eyesight. "Amongst the shadows."

 

Hands on hips, she leans forward with a determined squint. She draws back sharply when her eyes reach the treeline. “Something’s moving out there.”

 

"Correct."

 

"But what?”

 

You pull your arms in tightly against yourself and reply with more sharpness than is deserved. “I don’t know. But I doubt it’s here to help us.”

 

Her hand reaches for your arm, hangs hesitantly in the air for a moment before retreating. “Close the door and come inside. It’s cold.”

 

You sigh, but do not disagree.

 

Together, you retreat.

 

"My earlier conduct was inappropriate,” she says some time later, curled in on herself in the study chair opposite you. There’s no fire in the grate, only ashes, and you turn from your place at your desk to listen. “You have my apologies.”

 

“You don’t have to – I’m-” you say haltingly, words sticking in your throat like tar. You hadn’t wanted to discuss it, not yet. You’re too busy trying to bury the thoughts the incident had uncovered. “Think no more of it,” you finish, cursing the awkward finality of your words.

 

“I understand.” She turns away, and you can no longer see her expression.

 

You think of the cruel, blue-eyed girl still drifting in the back of your mind. You think of warmth, of kindness, of affection, and every time you do you feel her tearing you open once more like a warning from your past. You think of the stranger Rose must marry, her only escape from a life of poverty and pain. You think of the twisted sorceress who wouldn’t hesitate to rip Rose to pieces if she thought it would hurt you. You think of the family you tore apart in a jealous rage. You think of all the reasons why you can’t, why you mustn’t, why you don’t.

 

You wish you could stop thinking.

 

More than anything, you refuse to put Rose’s life in any more danger than it’s already in. Your love is the most dangerous thing there is.

 

“I’m going to speak with her,” you say with finality. Rose looks up sharply at the sound of your voice.

 

“Kanaya,” she replies, tone heavy with warning.

 

“I want information. I want to be prepared this time, prepared for whatever those shadows are, and whatever else she’s planned for us out in the dark. The only way to do that is to meditate. If I open my mind to her she may let something slip.” You stand, and Rose mirrors the action.

 

Her eyes darken like the sky before a storm as she grabs your arm. “You won’t. I forbid it.”

 

You raise your eyebrows. A snort almost slips past your lips. “You can’t forbid me from anything.” You turn away, but Rose pulls you back, insistent.

 

“You’ll be playing right into her hands. You can’t surrender yourself to her like this, you’ll be far too vulnerable.”

 

You scowl as you yank your arm from her grasp. “You forget that I’ve been doing this for years. I’m strong, and you told me yourself that your victory weakened her.”

 

Rose bites her lip. “Well.”

 

You frown. “Well?”

 

“Well. Certainly, the amount of power I can sense here is less by far than what it was. But calling it a sign of weakness… may have been rash on my part.” She glances up at you guiltily. “The more I thought about it, the more I wondered if it wasn’t a drain caused by her recent expansions of energy but perhaps… preparation.”

 

“Like she’s drawing back before she strikes,” you finish.

 

Rose shrugs, shakes her head. “Opening your mind to her could be all she needs to take over again. It could be you, this time.”

 

You shake your head. “I’ll never let her.”

 

“Of course you won’t.” Rose laughs bitterly. “I thought the same thing.” Before she can continue, the candle sitting on the mantelpiece flickers out. Rose twists around, scanning the room, her feet slipping into a ready stance. “She’s listening.”

 

Nothing materialises, but now there’s a tightness in your chest, and you feel the air vibrate around you as though someone were playing a low note just below your hearing range. The bruises still healing across your ribcage sting and you flex your healing fingers subconsciously.

 

"Lalonde!" you say, voice failing to hide a tremble.

 

“Don’t!” Rose hisses, back facing you as she edges you both into the centre of the room.

 

“Lalonde! Lalonde, I wish to speak with y-!” you call out, but Rose’s hand slams over your mouth before you can finish the sentence.

 

“Kanaya, I told you, it’s too dangerous!” Rose’s voice sounds fuzzy, distant, and you feel in the drooping of your eyelids that it’s already too late. Her eyes, on the other hand, are wide with fear, and her hand falls away from your mouth as it slips under your arm to catch you as your legs give out.

 

You think she’s laying you on the thick carpet, but it’s hard to tell as you’ve lost all feeling to your limbs. In the encroaching darkness the last shape you make out is the tense, panicked set of her jawline amidst a sweep of white hair. You think you mutter some sort of apology, but you have no idea if she’s heard it.

 

Then you’re gone.

 

“Kanaya! So kind of you to join me!”

 

Her face is identical to the one you saw moments ago, yet somehow much sharper, crueller, and while there may be warmth in her words you find none in her eyes.

 

The room has morphed into a strange, dream-like collage of different parts of your castle. The cold stone floor and metal bars of the dungeon cell you recently escaped stretch out beneath you. As your eyes move further away the jagged rock gives way to plush carpeting, and the mantelpiece and armchairs from your study reside amidst a scattering of silk throws and drapes from your room. This study-room fireplace, unlike the one you stood before moments ago, crackles warm and light, filling the space with a golden glow just bright enough to sting. Strange structures protrude from the walls and ceiling – off-angle pillars, random panels and tiles, and over the fireplace, a squint glassless window frame which looks out into darkness. Mixed in amongst this chaos you pick out several fragments of armour embedded in the brick and panelling.

 

You don’t reply to her greeting, opting instead to test the metal bars before you. The door rattles and swings open. You don’t advance, half-wishing it hadn’t opened. Now there is no barrier between the two of you.

 

She tuts as if she read your mind – which she probably did. This is all in your head, after all. “Always so suspicious. Come. Sit with me.” You blink, and suddenly you’re in the armchair before her. You flex your muscles, and find yourself stuck to it like a fly in honey. “You’re in quite the predicament, aren’t you?” She smiles gleefully. “More so than you think.”

 

Your eyes are drawn to the small table between the armchairs, currently lying on its side and missing a leg. The chess set which normally sits atop it is scattered across the floor, the board upended as the pieces lay tangled amongst the mess of drapes. The room shifts as the fragments of dungeon seep away, leaving the room more like your study by the second, if far messier than the original.

 

“I know you won’t let me leave this castle alive. You’ve made that much obvious.”

 

She laughs. “Alive! You! That’s funny.”

 

“You know what I mean,” you continue in a steady voice, feeling more and more with each word as though you’re trying to reason with a hurricane. “You have more tricks than a swirling black hallucination planned for us. Those shadows in the forest, for instance.”

 

“Oh, really, I’m just doing you a favour. There’s all kinds of nasty things hiding in this valley, anything could have happened. I wouldn’t want you to be eaten by wolves before I was done with you!”

 

"I see." You swallow. "I have a proposition.”

 

She snorts. “Are you in any place to offer one?”

 

You look away. “No.”

 

You don’t expect the sigh of disappointment which escapes her. “Giving up so easily. I had really hoped you would have done better. You were such a fierce creature, once upon a time. What happened to that little monster?”

 

“She saw the error of her ways.” You swallow again, force yourself to make eye-contact. “I want you to let Rose go. Let her escape in safety. She’s among the last of your family, and has done nothing to hurt you.”

 

Lalonde leans forward. “And what would I gain from sacrificing my little pawn?”

 

“You get me. I stay here, with you. You can torture me for an eternity, whatever you want. Just let her go.”

 

“You’re forgetting, Kanaya.” The room shifts, spins, knocks you to the floor, and suddenly you’re in the entrance hall, kneeling as she stands above, the re-assembled guards standing around you both in a perfect circle. “You’re forgetting about _this._ ” She reaches out and thrusts her hand into your chest.

 

For a moment everything blackens as you scream into the void of perfect agony. Somewhere on the other side, you hear Rose screaming back. The fragile beating life in your chest constricts in panic, setting every nerve in your body alight until you feel as though you’re a walking inferno. Lalonde pulls back, and the connection snaps, but it takes several moments for the pain to recede enough for you to lift your head once more. “If either one of you leaves this castle without the other, both of you die. It’s my lovely little trap.”

 

You blink at the marble floor tiles lodged in the walls, which are splattered with dripping droplets of red. You shake your head, once, twice, and they’re gone. From the deepest reaches of your gut, an impossible sound emerges. A laugh.

 

“It wasn’t your _trap_. It was an accident. You tried to make her kill me, and you _failed_.” The laugh grows louder, cut off abruptly when she seizes you by the throat and pulls you to your feet.   

 

There's no smile now, but bared teeth and lips turned down into a snarl. “Your point?”

 

You try to push yourself away from the hand once again at your throat, but it's as though there's an invisible wall pressing at your back. You cough, struggling to force the words past your lips. “You can reverse it. I know you can. You can undo the spell. Then she goes and I stay. You win.”

 

She lets go and you abruptly drop to the floor once more. “Interesting.” She walks a wide circle around you, footsteps echoing off what has once again become dungeon walls. “Yet it never occurred to you that _she_ might wish for a say in all this?”

 

You bite your lip. You know what Rose would say about your proposition. “Do you care?”

 

A smile curls around her lips. “Good point.” She snaps her fingers. “It’s a deal. But first, I have some conditions.”

 

You turn with her as she circles you, refusing to let her slip from your eye-line. Never turn your back on an enemy - the most important lesson you ever learned. “Oh?”

 

“I need to be back in Rose’s body long enough to reverse the switch. Which is…” She purses her lips. “Difficult.”

 

“She’s stronger than you.” Once again that strange surge of laughter wells within you. You’ve learned your lesson after her last reaction to being mocked, so you stifle it. “Strong enough for you to need my help defeating her.”

 

“Quiet,” she says sharply. “Once the deed is done you’ll have to escort her out of the castle. There’s some kind of pathetic excuse for a search party lead by her betrothed that’s been doddering around the foothills for some time. They seem to think she’s been abducted.” She punctuates the sentence with a gleeful smirk. “I’ll make sure they’ll be there to rescue her from the big bad monster that’s been keeping her here. She can sail away and find her happily ever after.”

 

You nod. “Anything else?”

 

“Of course.” She steps forward. Candlelight flickers around you, although you cannot find its source. “Assurance.”

 

“Of?”

 

“Your commitment.”

 

You shake your head. “I don’t-”

 

“I know you’ve taken the liberty of ransacking my library enough times to know what this is.” With her finger, she draws a symbol in the air, two half-circles facing one another. The candlelight fades away as a faint purple glow replaces it. The symbol floats between you in the air, illuminating her eyes with a sinister gleam as her sharp cheekbones cast long shadows along her skin. She’s right. You recognise it from the half-a-dozen or so diagrams you’ve seen scattered throughout her black magic texts, and even if you had never laid eyes upon her texts you would still have known it. Every one of your knights has the same symbol burned across their breastplates. The mark of control.

 

“You have to agree to the spell for it to work,” she continues, “and from that point on, you are incapable of disobeying me. The perfect assurance.”

 

Your mouth dries as the glowing symbol draws your eyes despite your best efforts to resist. You think of the empty, faceless suits of armour you ordered around for so long. You’d be condemning yourself to the same life. Empty. “You ask too much,” you reply firmly. “This measure is unnecessary.”

 

“You seem to think you’re in a position to be bargaining. I can assure you you’re not.”

 

You try to shake your head, but your body feels stiff, your limbs heavy and unmoving like those of a doll. “I have no way of knowing that you’ll hold up your end of the bargain.”

 

“As I said.” She leans in closer, and the shadows the symbol hollows out around her eyes give her a manic look, pupils narrowed to slits as her irises shimmer fervently in the purple light “You’re in no position to be bargaining.”

 

Your eyes linger on the symbol for so long it’s burned onto your retinas, flashing in your mind even when you look away. The heart in your chest taps away at a quickened pace, desperate to pull you away from its burning light. If you closed your eyes and focused, you would perhaps find the dream fragmenting and fading around you, and you would feel instead the warmth of Rose’s arms, her worried whispers as she tried to pull you from your trance.

 

You’d do anything for her.

 

“I consent.”   

 

You have no time to regret the words as she leans forward, smiling, and taps her fingers against your chest. “With this heart, you are bound.”

 

There’s a bright burst of light and you scream as you feel the symbol burning agonizingly into your chest.

 

As the room darkens and dissolves around you, as your feet fall away from the floor and into nothingness, as your limbs grow heavy and stiff like steel, you hear only her voice, issuing her first instruction.

 

“Weaken her for me, Kanaya. Let me into her head. Only then can we save her.”

                                                                                             

Then nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kanaya, queen of Good and Sensible Decisions (TM)


	11. The Labyrinth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Only by betraying her can you save her.

Rose allows you exactly three seconds of undisturbed consciousness before she begin to lecture you.

 

“Of all the stupid, selfish, irresponsible-!” She falls silent when you hold a finger to her lips. The newly-branded symbol is still agony cross your chest, but you can’t let her notice.  You bite down on the pain as you shush her, forcing a smile to your lips.

 

“Please, Rose, there’s no need for theatrics. She gave me all I hoped for and more.”

 

"Which is?" she asks as she helps you to your feet. It takes you a few moments to steady yourself and you have to take a deep breath to stop your head from spinning.

 

"There's a search party coming. Lead by, uh.” You pause and awkwardly remove your hands from her grasp. “The boy you are to marry.”

 

Rose tuts and rolls her eyes, which wasn’t the response you expected. “He really can’t take a hint.”

 

“I think he might be under the impression that you were kidnapped? Or abducted? Or otherwise lured here, I’m not sure. Either way, I’m not sure your search party will be particularly happy to see me.”

 

Rose tuts again. "I left _very clear instructions_ that I was not to be followed.”

 

“I suppose he-” Your voice falters. “Must really care for you.”

 

Her hand shifts a little closer to yours, as though she’s restraining herself from taking it. “He’s nice, but…” Her eyes meet yours. “Not my type.”

 

“Ah.” You swallow. “Yes.” You look away. “But without taking back this castle for your family, you’ll still have to…?”

 

Now it’s her turn to look away. “I don’t know.”

 

“Well.” You climb to your feet and offer her your hand. “First we’ll have to find them.” Rose accepts it, doubt etched into her features.

 

“I’m not sure, Kanaya. If we go outside I’ll have to fight her again. All it takes is a moment of weakness, and she…she’ll be back inside my mind.”

 

You tilt your head to one side, considering. The mark on your chest tingles, as though affected by her words. "We have to leave somehow."

 

“Kanaya.” Rose draws herself up as though becoming surer of herself by the moment. “There’s no way I’m chancing letting her back into my mind. It was…” Her voice cracks. “It was the most horrific experience. I’d rather rot in your dungeons than give her the chance to hurt you again.”

 

"The dungeons,” you mutter to yourself. “The dungeons.” You are instantly struck by a terrible idea, one so recklessly dangerous and bound to fail that, had you any choice, you would have dismissed it immediately.

 

Unfortunately, the obedience spell forces the words past your lips as though you’re part of some perverse act of ventriloquism. “We can leave through the dungeons. There’s dozens of old passages branching out under the castle. Most of them lead out into the valley sooner or later.”

 

Rose’s eyebrows scrunch together sceptically, a mannerism you have come to recognise as painfully adorable. “I read of those tunnels. They’re booby-trapped to catch intruders and escaping prisoners, are they not?”

 

“Booby-traps or your dear ancestor. The choice is all yours.” You bow your head graciously.

 

Rose sighs. “Deep, dark maze of tunnels it is.”

 

Her agreement pains you greatly, but you can’t let it show. For if the trials and tribulations of the tunnels awaiting you doesn’t weaken her enough for Lalonde’s means, you doubt anything will.

 

You remind yourself sharply that Rose’s life depends upon this plan. No matter what the personal cost, you must persevere. For a moment, you imagine the faint sound of childish laughter.

 

Having made your preparations once again, the pair of you descend the many flights of stairs until you find yourself in the final connecting corridor which leads down to the dungeons. The guards are still standing there, as they have done so for some time, quietly collecting dust. You catch sight of the control spell symbol branded across the chest-piece of the one nearest you, and subconsciously reach up to trace the shape upon yourself. You took a moment earlier to undress and examine it in solitude, and while it burned painfully enough to feel as though it encompassed your entire torso, the reality is that the symbol matches only the diameter of your palm in size, placed a little below your collarbones in the small flat stretch above your heart. The scorched skin is an awful bright pinkish-red which stands in stark contrast to the surrounding brown, still sore under probing fingers. Had your figure been more suited to low-cut garments, you would have been devastated. Thankfully, your sister’s preferred style, as much as you admired it, never particularly suited you. Nonetheless, you have bandaged the mark as best you can to avoid it rubbing painfully against the fabric of your clothes. Travel cloak once again wrapped around your shoulders – for even underground there is no guarantee of a reprieve from the wind and the damp – you step forward, trying to avert your gaze from the suits of armour which flank you on either side.

 

Rose draws a little closer to you as you pass them in silence. You’re too nervous to speculate as to who is in control of the guards now, and you don’t ask, too fearful of the answer you may receive. About halfway down the narrow passage, you hear the faintest creak of metal behind you.

 

When you turn to look back, you find the helmets of half a dozen suits facing you. Following you.

 

“You’re not making them do that, are you?” you ask, despite already knowing the answer.

 

Rose shakes her head, lips pressed together. Taking you by the arm, she turns you away and leads you towards the old wooden door, significantly quicker than before. You both slip through the door quickly and slam it shut behind you, but not quickly enough to hear the quiet creaks and squeaks of moving metal from the other side.

 

You both pause, waiting, but if there’s any further movement on the other side you don’t hear it.

 

“Does this door lock?” Rose whispers, still holding the handle.

 

“From this side? No,” you reply. “It would be a peculiar kind of dungeon that locked people out _and_ in.”

 

“Fine, hush, let me concentrate a moment.” Eyes closed, she reaches up and draws a mark you don’t recognise across the door, which glows pink as it burns into the wood. “That should hold it,” she says, her breathing heavier than before. “Perhaps an unnecessary measure, but I’d rather we didn’t find any unexpected company following us.”

 

You’re glad; the more magic she uses, the faster she tires, the sooner she’ll be out of danger. As much out of danger as one can be while possessed by a murderous spirit, anyway.

 

The glow has faded into darkness, so you’re careful to lead Rose down the steps, distrusting the weak light of the candle she produced from her satchel and her equally poor vision.

 

The cells remain as you left them. A pool of black still lies around the one in which you were imprisoned, all that remains of the magically melted bars. Several fragments of the shattered guard lie strewn across your path, and in their midst an abandoned candlestick. You lead Rose through the debris with care, your eyes catching on the dried-out smears of blood where your face was dragged along the craggy outcrop.

 

If returning to the setting of such violence and destruction has any effect upon Rose, she refuses to show it.

 

You soon reach the end of the row of cells. As the barred-off alcoves fall away the tunnel splits off into a maze, each passage growing lower and narrower as though not built with humans in mind. Water drips faintly in the distance, and you stoop to avoid tiny stalactite formations from catching the top of your head.

 

You both pause at the first junction, considering your options.

 

“From here on out I’m as lost as you are,” you whisper.

 

Rose takes your hand in hers. “Then we’re lost together.”

 

It’s quiet, too quiet, as you take only a single step forward.

 

But a single step is all it takes.

 

You hear the shriek of ancient, rusted cogs grinding together amidst the knocking of wood against metal. The word _trap_ barely has time to flash in your mind, far too late to be of any use, when the floor beneath you drops away and you tumble into nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kanaya: *is literally branded*  
> Kanaya: But What Are The Implications For The Kinds Of Dresses I Can Wear


	12. The Landing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Her weight in your arms and the weight of the future on your shoulders.

You wake to the stench of death.

 

It's thick in the air like tar, seeping into your senses and blocking out all else.

 

You try to move your arm in the hope of muzzling yourself with it, anything to beat the smell back and clear your head. Instead of obeying you as it should the limb flops pathetically while your joints groan in pain. You may not have fallen far enough to break anything, but nonetheless you’re bruised, scratched and aching from head to toe.

 

Rose must have dropped the candle in the fall; you’re now in total darkness, so black even your advanced vision cannot penetrate it. The opening you fell through which should still lie open above you could now have vanished for all you can tell.

 

You lift your head with a groan, peering into the dark in the vain hope that your eyes may adjust. You’ve landed on grainy dirt floor, and as you stretch out your arms your fingers fall upon long spikes of rotting wood, most of which lie splintered or snapped on their sides. Once they were likely positioned upright, ready to spear through any travellers like yourselves unlucky enough to fall upon them. You, however, were fortunate; the rot has left them far too soft to do anything other than collapse instantly under your weight, leaving this trap nowhere near as deadly as it once was. You’ve escaped with nothing worse than several splinters and a few more bruises for your collection, but judging by fragments of bone mixed in amongst the shattered spikes, long picked clean by the rats and goodness knew what else, others had not been so fortunate.

 

Nonetheless, it was still quite a drop, and you call out to Rose with some alarm. “Rose, are you alright?”

 

You hear her low moan in response, and the fragile heart hidden within your chest momentarily grinds to a halt.

 

You crawl through the dirt on hands and knees, following the sound of her voice and ignoring the crunch of rotting wood and bone beneath you.

 

Your hands fall upon the hem of her skirt, and soon her hand is in yours. “Rose, talk to me!”

 

“I’m…” she coughs as though trying to force air into her lungs. “…fine.”

 

You don’t waste time addressing the lie, all your senses zeroing in on the hot stench of blood.

 

The spike had snapped under Rose’s weight, but not before the point had lodged itself slightly below her ribcage. Rose whines, shaking as you examine her torso with painfully delicate touch. You whisper a string of apologies but don’t stop – without light, this is your only option.

 

It’s bad. It’s very bad. You need to focus, but your head his spinning – maybe because of the blood, maybe because you hit it harder than you thought – and Rose is flailing, protesting, trying to talk to you, but her words are fuzzy like cotton wool in your ears, and your hands, they’re slick with her blood. Warm.

 

A fist collides with the side of your head. It's a weak punch, but it’s enough to jerk you back to attention.

 

“ _Kanaya_.”

 

“I’m – I was…”

 

“Kanaya, I understand, but…” She pauses to wince. “I need you to focus.”

 

“Yes. Right. Yes.”

 

The spare headscarf at the bottom of your satchel makes for a poor dressing, but nonetheless you press it against the wound with trembling fingers. You still can’t believe Rose managed to land on the only spike still upright and capable of doing any damage. You consider the possibility of foul play with a shudder. Rose is trying to help keep pressure on, but judging by the awkward angling of her hands she knows even less about healing than you, and her movements are growing sloppier as she loses more and more blood.

 

“Rose? Stay with me. Is there something we can do? What about magic?”

 

She shakes her head – or, you _think_ she does, because you still can’t see a thing. “No. Too much. I won’t risk – she could – not losing you to -!” She’s spitting blood between breaths, and you hold the back of her neck to prop her head up. “We have to keep moving.”

 

“You’re delirious.”

 

“I’m not. Something… Something is coming for us. We have to keep moving.”

 

“Rose.”

 

“Help me up. We have to… Have to…” Her grip on your arms is insistent as she tries to haul herself upright.

 

"Rose." Surely she can feel your heart breaking in her chest.

 

“Kanaya.” Her hands scramble for grip, nails digging into your shoulders. Judging by the desperation in her voice, she can.

 

Judging by the raw terror burning through your chest, you can feel her heart breaking too.

 

You don’t know if the impulse comes from her heart or yours; all you know is that in the pitch black her lips are soft and desperate, and although you may hate yourself for it the wet tinge of blood sends a bolt of heat through your body like lightning. Rose stills, and you wonder if any other force on the face of this earth could have achieved the same effect.

 

"Can you carry me?" she whispers, breath gentle against your skin.

 

You press your forehead against hers. "For as long as I have arms to hold you.”

 

Her laugh is so faint you can’t be sure you heard it. “Then so be it.”

 

Against your better judgement, you lift her in your arms and begin to edge your way through the debris of spikes until you find a tunnel through which to leave. Rose curls in against you, arms around your neck, cloak trailing along the floor and tangling with your feet.

 

You’re not sure how far or how long you walk. The tunnels are a blessing and a curse; no sunlight to fear, but no means of measuring time either. You can’t orientate yourself in this maze of twists and turns; you could be miles from your castle, or you could be meters from where you started. Rose is hovering somewhere between conscious and not, murmuring under her breath and shaking her head violently whenever you give any indication of stopping.

 

But with every step, the heart in your chest beats a little slower. You're beginning to feel the drain as well, as though it were your body the blood was seeping from. In a way, it is.

 

Despite her protests you eventually stop, partly to check her wound but mostly because you doubt you could trust your legs to carry you much further.

 

You tear a strip from the hem of your cloak and exchange it for your headscarf, which you abandon on the dirt floor in favour of clean dressings. Rose barely complains, and you wish you could take that as a good sign.

 

“It’s not looking good, is it?”

 

You shudder. “Not _now_.”

 

Lalonde smiles. She stands over you, visible in the dark despite neither creating nor reflecting light. The air around her vibrates, and you can feel the movement in your bones. You’re not unconscious this time. Instead of visiting her, she’s visiting you, a shimmering apparition that would turn to mist should you try to touch her. Of course, you would never naturally entertain such a foolish idea.

 

“Why not now? I can’t help you if you won’t let me.”

 

“I’m concentrating.” Your hands are busy with bandages. Rose shifts and mutters under your touch, and you hope she remains unaware of your visitor.

 

"We're almost there, Kanaya."

 

“You won’t be able to do very much if you waste all your energy taunting me,” you hiss under your breath.

 

“Oh, this isn’t a casual visit at all. You’ve made good progress.”

 

"Meaning?” you snap.

 

“Don’t be rude.” The instruction burns, and, however insignificant it may be, you know you must obey. You press your lips into a thin line as she continues. “My meaning is that you’ve advanced our plans far enough.”

 

You shake your head. "I couldn't make her use more magic. She refused. There’s no way she’s exhausted her powers yet.”

 

“Oh, you foolish child. Look at her.” The tunnel walls glow bright with phosphorescent light which sends a hiss of pain through your teeth. Rose is ghostly white in the few places where her skin isn’t caked in dust and dirt, and her blood is already seeping through her new dressings. Her eyebrows scrunch together in the light yet her eyes remain closed. “It doesn’t matter how much magic she has. Not while she’s in this state.” Rose’s hand reaches up in your direction, trembling, before flopping down at her side. You take her hand and squeeze it.

 

"Then why are you still standing there? Possess her. Break the spell. Free us. Save her.”

 

She crouches down, violet dress pooling around her to be on eye level, elbows resting on her knees and her fingers tented. Then she smiles. “Not quite yet.”

 

“Why not?!”

 

Rose stirs, eyes fluttering open and widening when she sees her ancestor. Her grip on your hand squeezes tight with panic. “Kanaya!”

 

You squeeze it back. “It’s fine, Rose.”

 

She struggles to push herself up, but her arms shake under her weight. “What do you mean, can’t you see…?” She trails off as her eyes darken with understanding. “What did you do.” It sounds closer to an accusation than a question. You lock your jaw, blinking fast in fear of the tears threatening to come to them.

 

“I’m sorry, Rose.”

 

"What did you _do_?"

 

"Show her." Lalonde's order cuts through the air like a dagger, and you flinch. Her order needs no clarification, and you cannot disobey no matter how your mind screams against it.

 

The first tear flickers past your cheek as you undo the buttons at the top of your chest, and more follow as you tear away the bandages over the still-raw mark.

 

It’s painful, yes, but nowhere close to the pain in Rose’s eyes. She recognises the symbol immediately.

 

“Kanaya. Kanaya, no. Please tell me you didn’t,” she begs, eyes screwing up as though she can’t stand to see what you’ve done to yourself.

 

You swallow, shaking, struggling to force the words past the paralysis that has taken over your throat. “I’m sorry, Rose.”

 

Lalonde senior’s eyes are blown wide like those of a predator. For once, she isn’t smiling, her expression intent and frozen in place as she watches you with undisguised exhilaration.

 

She doesn’t hold your attention for long, because Rose is crying now, hand reaching for the semi-circles burnt into your skin. Her fingers tremble as they skirt the edges of the design, her voice quiet and quivering. “ _Why_?”

 

“I just wanted you to be safe,” you sob. “Please, I’m so sorry, Rose. I had to keep you safe.”

 

She shakes her head. “Kanaya. You have no idea what you’ve done.”

 

A high, cold laugh tears through the air. Lalonde’s calm has passed like the eye of a storm.

 

You’re suddenly certain that you have made a terrible mistake.

 

“Kanaya, dear, as touching as this was to watch, I have a new order for you.” The light still flowing from the walls begins to flicker and flash, burning your eyes one second and plunging you into darkness the next. “Kindly take the hunting knife from your bag.”

 

You can’t hesitate; your arms dive, puppet-like, for the bag. The blade is a little longer than the length of your hand, with jagged teeth along one side. Your knuckles pale from such a tight grip on the handle. Rose is wriggling away from you, her movements frantic. She pushes herself up against the opposite wall, eyes wide.

 

“Rose, you have to get away,” you whisper, voice strained. She doesn’t reply, her gaze blank with terror like a deer before a wolf.

 

“Now,” Lalonde continues. “Kindly plunge that knife into your dear Rose’s heart.”

 

Your body springs forward of its own accord, knife sweeping down in a high arc.

 

The last thing you hear is Rose’s scream.      

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "You’re suddenly certain that you have made a terrible mistake" yeah no shit Kan
> 
> This was one of the most intense chapters to write. I wonder if you can guess how this fight will end?


	13. The Kill

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Your love is all you have left to give.

You both know the fight is over before it even begins.

 

Rose is already exhausted, badly wounded and bleeding out. It’s a miracle that she’s able to put up any resistance at all.

 

You bring the knife down just as she rolls to the side. The blade catches her cheek but misses its target as she dives out of reach, hand pressing against the wound in her abdomen as a trickle of blood seeps from the diagonal slit across her cheek.

 

“Kanaya!”

 

You climb to your feet, your grip on the knife knuckle-white. You try to speak, but the order has locked your mouth shut. You want to scream, beg, anything, but all you can do is attack. You lunge forwards again, and Rose yells your name once more as she ducks under the blade’s arc. Lalonde is nowhere in sight, but you don’t doubt she’s laughing at you at this very moment, urging you onwards with all the power she has.

 

There’s no room for Rose to dodge, so she brings her foot up and jams it out, kicking into your abdomen. You double over, winded, as the knife slips through your fingers. It clatters onto the floor and Rose is quick to kick it from your reach.

 

You turn, but before your eyes can pick out the glint of silver amongst the dirt, Rose mutters something incomprehensible and the supernatural glow emanating from the tunnel walls flickers out like candlelight.

 

You fall upon your hands and knees, hands raking reverently through loose soil in search of the knife. All the while, Rose is muttering a stream of incantations, but judging by the cursing which punctuates every other word, none of them are working.

 

Pain is building in your chest, desperation, and you unwillingly scrabble for the knife as though your life depends on it, simultaneously praying you won’t find it. For a moment you freeze as your mind threatens to tear itself apart with the conflict.

 

Rose’s voice cuts through the haze, low and pained. “I can’t undo it, Kanaya, her spell is too strong.”

 

The only sound you can force through your throat is a low grunt. Your hands continue to scrabble across the floor like a starving rodent in search of flesh. It’s a fitting image, because with every passing moment your grip on your own body loosens as though your very essence is drifting away from it, leaving nothing but animal instinct in its place.

 

The instinct of an animal born to kill.

 

Your hands fall upon the knife.

 

You hear scrabbling, and judge that Rose is using the cave wall as support to try and force herself to her feet. She’s shuffling back from you at the same speed at which your feet are forcing you forward, back scraping against the wall. “Kanaya, you have to listen to me.” The fear in her voice is clear, but with it uncertainty, as though she can’t tell if there’s anything left of you to reason with.

 

This time, the sound you make is closer to a hiss. Your arm lashes out of its own accord and bile rises in your throat as it connects with something soft. Rose slides to the floor with a whimper.

 

You’re moving slowly now, like a panther lurking in the shadows seconds before it strikes. Lalonde’s will is seeping through your body like poison, and she wants this moment to _last_.

 

"We both know I can't outrun you," Rose spits.

 

You crouch before her, your hand shooting forward to force her back against the wall. The blood trickling down her cheek dribbles onto your hand as you hold her head in place. Rose’s arms hang limply at her sides, body still aside from the heaving of her chest.  

Suddenly, you have a voice. You’re not sure whose it is.

 

“You’ve given up,” you say blankly.

 

A pause, a heavy sigh. “I’m so tired, Kanaya.”

 

“Another trick. Another spell.”

 

“There is nothing,” she replies. “Kanaya. I’m sorry.” She pushes your hand away, pulling you close despite the danger. The dagger is still in your hand, ice-cold against your skin, inches from its target. The impulse is building hot and fast in your veins, the impulse to strike. The rise is unstoppable, burning within you even as Rose wraps her arms around you, forehead pressed against yours. She’s been dropped in a pit and dragged through a labyrinth, yet still the faint lavender scent encircles her like a silver aura. The phosphorescent tunnel light is still flickering in and out at random intervals, painting her skin a ghostly white one moment and plunging the pair of you back into darkness the next. “Close your eyes, Kanaya.” Her hand smooths across your cheek.

 

“I can’t.” Your eyes are hungry, desperate for every second they have left to look at her.

 

“Don’t watch.”

 

“I have to,” you say. The symbol burnt into your skin is sending pulses of crackling pain through your body like a second, deadly heartbeat. You have no choice but to watch; it’s what she wants. To break you by breaking her.

 

You can't close your eyes. You can't even blink.

 

“Then look me in the eyes.” She takes your chin and holds your head level with hers. “And listen to my voice. My voice and nothing else.”

 

You nod, blinking away the tears which are blurring your vision. Your arm is pulling back, raising the blade, and were it not for Rose forcing your focus onto her you would be screaming.

 

“Kanaya Maryam, the monster of my dreams. I hated you for so long.” She’s speaking quickly, as though she can feel her last seconds slipping away like sand through an hourglass. “Except I know now it was never hate, what I felt. What I feel.”

 

“Then what?” you whisper. “What do you feel?” The knife hovers over her chest. Rose leans forward until the tip is pressing against her skin.

 

“Oh, Kanaya.” She smiles sadly. “Wasn’t it obvious?”

 

“Please, Rose,” you beg.

 

“An eye for an eye.” Her eyes burn into yours. “A heart for a heart.”

 

In a single, terrifying, beautiful moment, you suddenly understand what you have to do.

 

“Rose?”

 

“Yes, Kanaya?”

 

“I love you too.”

 

Without hesitation, you turn the knife inward and plunge it into your chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudos to you if you saw that one coming.


	14. The Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At last, you stand together.

“Well, that was unexpected.”

 

You open your eyes to a sea of white. Your first instinct is to scream, to recoil, before you realise that, somehow, it doesn’t hurt you as it should.

 

You push yourself upright. You’re engulfed in an endless blank space, bright and featureless. It’s not quite the same void Lalonde plunged you into as a trick, but it carries the same hollow echo. At least this place has something resembling a floor to stand upon, as smooth and featureless as everything else.

 

It’s a few moments before you remember the voice that greeted you. You spin around to find Lalonde sitting cross-legged before you. At least, you assume it’s Lalonde. She’s older by far, skin wrinkled and her spine curled as though the weight of a hundred years were pressing down upon it. Her faded lilac eyes stare up at you through sunken sockets. As terrified as you were in this woman’s presence mere moments ago, every instinct tells you that you have little to fear from her now.

 

You take a seat opposite her, arranging your robes carefully around your knees. They’re no longer ragged and smeared with dirt from the tunnels but bright and pristine, as though fresh off the tailor’s mannequin. The clean clothing sparks your mind into action, and you clutch at your chest where you had plunged the knife moments ago.

 

Upon exposing the stretch of smooth dark skin you find no sign of injury – not even the mark of obedience remains.

 

“You don’t have to worry about such matters here,” she says in a cracked, gravelly voice. You stare at her lips, ready to swear that you never saw them move, and when she speaks again, straight into your mind, she confirms your suspicions. “We’re both beyond such tricks, now. We’re somewhere else entirely.”

 

"Where?" you reply, somehow both speaking and not. The word never passes your lips, yet she inclines her head as though she heard it clear as day.

 

“Not quite here. Not quite there. It’s an in-between sort of place.”

 

"I'm dead," you reply flatly.

 

“You’ve been dead for years. This is the part that comes after.”

 

“What about Rose?” You ask, shaking. There’s no longer a heart beating in your chest, and you have no way of knowing if she survived your stunt. You were still connected by the curse, and for all you know it made no difference whose chest you tore open. You could both have still met the same fate.

 

“Alive. But not for long.”

 

“How-?”

 

"The heart in her chest and the magic surrounding it is keeping her going in one way or another. Who knows, perhaps there’s a little more vampire in her than any of us knew.” She tilts her head to one side. “The gaping wound in her side, on the other hand…”

 

“But…” You bite your lip as your hands curl into fists. “I thought this might save her.”

 

“From you? Yes. From her wounds? No.”

 

You close your eyes for a moment and try to find comfort in the momentary darkness the action provides. “Who are you? You’re not Lalonde.”

 

When you open your eyes once more her gaze is sad despite the slight smile twitching at her lips. “You think that all those fragments and phantoms that spent so many years torturing you were a true reflection of the woman who once lived?”

 

You don’t know how to reply, and settle for a shake of your head.

 

“It’s true, they all make up a part of my soul, fragmented and lost to the wind as I died at your hand.”

 

You avert your eyes.

 

“The worst parts of my soul are the ones which remain trapped in the world in which they no longer belong. The cruellest, the most vengeful, the most bitter. Yet, without them, the rest of me is trapped. Trapped here without release, forced to watch myself as I tear my old world apart.” She reaches out, takes your hand in hers. Her skin is like ice, but her grip is firm. “You understand me, Kanaya. You are capable of terrible things. We’ve both born witness to that. Yet you’ve destroyed that part of yourself, and have learned to live in peace. I wish to return that peace to you as much as I wish to find my own.”

 

A single tear rolls uninvited down your cheek. "I have done so many unforgivable things to you. To those you love. Surely it can’t be so easy?”

 

The sad smile returns. “A hundred years is a long enough punishment, don’t you think?”

 

You bow your head. As hard as it may be to believe, you consider, for a moment, the possibility of forgiveness. From your worst enemy, no less. In another life, you would have been friends.

 

Lalonde snorts, her nose scrunching up momentarily in amusement. You’ve seen the same quirk in Rose’s features a dozen times. “Oh, Kanaya. Don’t you see? We already are.”

 

“Rose,” you whisper. Your heart sinks. You would give anything to help her right now.

 

“Anything won’t be necessary.”

 

Your head snaps up. Lalonde is climbing to her feet, and although you can’t be sure, her body is changing, growing closer by the second to the one you knew in life. She offers you her hand and you accept, letting her pull you to her feet.

 

“We are far from finished, Kanaya. Certain fragments of myself may have wasted a century’s worth of magic on cheap poltergeist trickery, but personally speaking, I’ve been saving up for something a little more important.”

 

You tighten your grip on her hand. “I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

 

She smiles, and for a moment, you see Rose in her eyes. “I hate to burden you like this, Kanaya, but such is life. And death, for that matter.” The sea of white around you is beginning to shimmer and fluctuate, punctuated with sudden flashes of black. “Return to your body. Save Rose. Then, if you have a moment to spare, save my soul.” She winks. “Good luck.”

 

The white void around you convulses, as though folding in on itself, and Rose Lalonde stands in the centre of it all, the air around her shimmering and pulsating. Just when you believe your mind may burst from the strain, she reaches towards you with glowing fingertips. “One last thing,” she says, and you blink with surprise when you see her lips moving to match her words. “I’d like to offer you my blessing.”

 

“Blessing for what?” you ask, too late to receive an answer. Her fingertips touch the centre of your chest and everything goes black.

 

Within your chest, a heart stutters back to life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *epic drum solo* she back


	15. The Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three souls, one saviour.

You’re alone in the tunnel when you awaken. It is by no means a gentle return; your heart pounds and your back arches as you splutter and gag. After the numb white of the void, your senses are overloaded as they struggle to readjust to the world you left. Pain is, naturally, the first to register amongst the cacophony of information flooding your mind. There’s a lot of it.

 

Your hand finds your chest which, while slick with blood, shows no sign of injury other than the symbol still burned into your flesh. It’s also rising and falling, fast like the beating of wings, and it hasn’t done that in a _long_ time. Your body feels strange, like it has been flooded with lightning, but you don’t have time to fully examine the changes. Your mind is occupied with Rose alone.

 

Many of your senses are oddly dulled; your nose can’t find her trail, nor can your eyes pick out any semblance of shape in the dark. Your chest continues to rise and fall in those distracting motions, almost as though it _needs_ to, almost as though you’re…

 

… _breathing._

 

You were not returned to the body of a vampire. You were returned to _life_.

 

Shock and panic threaten to flood your mind, along with a million questions you cannot answer, but the image of Rose dying in the dark is a strong dam to hold them back. You can’t imagine how she could have made any distance with her injuries, unless…

 

Unless the unthinkable has happened once again.

 

You climb to your feet, heart pounding, and set off after her.

 

You follow the fading trail, your stamina pathetic under your new constraints – really, how could one body need so much air? You expect to round a corner at any moment and find Rose, collapsed from exhaustion, or worse. The trail is so recent, and Rose couldn’t possibly match your speed in her current state.

 

Unless, of course, it isn’t Rose you’re following.

 

Your pace quickens.

 

After a dozen more twists and turns, you round a corner and slam into a wooden wall.

 

You curse, rubbing your nose as you examine the wall with your fingers. The wood doesn’t match the dirt around it, and from the sides and floor the faintest breath of air is slipping through.

 

“An exit,” you murmur, hope surging. If you have found one of the mountainside exits at last, then by now you must be miles from your castle, enough distance by far to weaken Lalonde’s grip considerably. Perhaps this was Rose’s plan, following her own instincts to escape.

 

You heave against the wooden panel with your shoulder to no avail. There’s no sign of a handle or lever, and with every moment that passes your frustration grows. You growl low in your throat. “ _Let me through_ ,” you grind through your teeth to no avail. Perhaps the exit is enchanted, and will only operate for a sorceress, leaving you trapped down here indefinitely.

 

Yet, almost unnoticed in your mind, the slightest _tug_ of conformation responds to your command.

 

You fall still. Had you imagined it?

 

No. The connection remains, insistent, strengthening with every moment, familiar.

 

Rose. It has to be. Magic has brought her back to save you, and now you can make your escape together. A smile steals across your face as excitement blossoms within you.

 

 Then, from the other side, you hear the clank of hollow metal.

 

The door swings open and your eyes widen.     

 

The scene which presents itself is not one of open air. There is no distant mountainside. The figure which meets you is not your Rose.

 

You step through the secret passage and into your library as the guard pushes the bookshelf back into place behind you.

 

Excitement turns to dread in a matter of moments as you add together the many twists and turns the tunnels took you through to find at the end of the equation no more than a giant loop. You’re back where you started all over again.

 

You turn to the guard which stands in place by the bookshelf which, now in place, is indiscernible from any other.

 

You frown. It tilts its head.

 

“Who’s controlling you?”

 

With a creak of metal on metal it… _shrugs_.

 

You fight the impulse to take a step back. You’ve seen many strange sights over the last few days. Your guards finding a mind of their own is, somehow, the most disturbing.

 

With the sheer quantity of rogue power flying around, you’re thankful more inanimate objects haven’t begun to wander around of their own accord.

 

You slip away through the library doors without another word.

 

The castle is as quiet as a tomb. You pass several guards, motionless, and you take care to give them a wide berth as you make your way through endless empty corridors, hoping they will interfere no further with what is to pass. The curtains haven’t been drawn, open instead to a vast expanse of black night interrupted by a single thin slither of moonlight. Without candles, it’s the only light you have to guide you.

 

Your quarters have been ransacked, the chaos resembling that left in the wake of a hurricane. Various bottles of potions and ingredients which you left undisturbed upon the dresser have been spilled, emptied or overturned, while the walls have been smeared in places with a dark, grainy substance akin to soot. 

 

Most notably, the ornate looking-glass which hung upon your wall has become no more than a mass of broken fragments, as though the mirror had exploded under some supernatural force, throwing its remains at every corner and surface. Several shards have embedded themselves in the faded green wallpaper while others protrude from drapes and pillows. Standing in the centre of the room, you feel as though every jagged edge is pointing at you like the tip of a knife. The curtains remain drawn as you left them, but judging by the cold air fanning them out the mirror was not the only glass destroyed.

 

Signs of spell-casting aside, she’s still nowhere in sight.

 

You stumble from your room, shards of glass cracking under your shoes as you make your retreat. The wind seems to have followed you beyond your quarters, curling around you and whispering half-formed words in your mind. You grit your teeth, pace breaking into a run, but the hum of the air through the castle corridors is inescapable, and fear rises in your throat as every portrait which lines the castle walls follows you, eyes shining with malice.

 

Your presence is no longer a secret here.

 

You paid no attention to where your feet were taking you; it’s only when you arrive at your destination that you realise that you were heading there all along.

 

The portrait of High Sorceress Rose Lalonde towers over you at the head of the entrance hall, eyes sparkling even in the dim half-light.   

 

"Kanaya?"

 

The voice sends shivers down your spine. For a moment you swear it came from the portrait, but when you turn to face down towards the grand double doors you find the true source.

 

“Kanaya? Is that really you?” The hood of her tattered travel cloak is pulled up over her head but you can still see soot-dusted cheeks cupped by a curtain of silver hair. “I don’t understand, you’re-?”

 

She moves to take a step forward, and you take one back. “Stay back,” you say, voice low.

 

“What?” She raises her hands to lower her hood. You can see evidence of the dried blood under her fingernails in the red-brown tips at the end of each finger, but when she turns her wide indigo eyes up to you there’s no sign of the cut you left across her cheek. Nor, for that matter, does she show any sign of the injury that had brought her to the brink of death.

 

You take another step back. “Stay where you are.”

 

“Kanaya.” She blinks, voice trembling. “You were dead.”

 

“Most vampires are,” you say flatly.

 

“I mean-!”

 

“Dispense with the pretences, Lalonde. I’d like to imagine we’ve moved beyond such foolishness.”

 

“Kanaya, it’s me.” She steps forward again, but this time when you move back you hit the wall behind you, the portrait’s frame biting at your back.

 

" _Stop it,"_ you hiss.

 

“How can I prove it’s me?”

 

You cast your gaze around the room “…give me an order.”

 

“An order?”

 

“Just do it!”

 

Rose shrugged. “Stand on one leg.”

 

The instruction has no effect. Your feet remain firmly planted upon the ground.

 

Your suspicion melts away. “Rose!” You close the distance between you in an instant, and before you know it she’s in your arms, warm and wonderfully alive. “I thought – I assumed the only reason you survived was because she took your body from you!”

 

“Don’t underestimate me, Kanaya,” she laughs into your hair. “How did _you_ survive?”

 

You lean back. “You’re not going to _believe_ it.”

 

She grins, but her eyes are intent, awaiting your answer. “Well?”

 

“Rose. We’ve both been through a lot, perhaps we should rest first, ensure you’re properly healed-?”

 

The strike hits you hard across your face, pain blossoming from your cheek from what you suspect may be a dislocated jaw. You stagger back, clutching your chin as you reel from the blow. The pain is so much sharper in a living body, and you’re acutely aware of how fragile you’ve become.

 

The voice calls to you in a terrible screech. “HOW DID YOU SURVIVE?!”

 

“Lalonde!” you spit despite the agony in your jaw.

 

"YOU BROKE MY SPELL! YOU RETURNED FROM THE DEAD!" She makes another swipe for you, but the last few days have done nothing if not improved your reflexes. You spring back, eager to gain distance yet unable to turn your back on her.

 

“If Rose isn’t alive and well in there, you will regret it.” You sidestep another lunge. “I promise.”

 

“Nobody can break an obedience spell! It’s a _heart spell_ , it’s _impossible_. How-?!” This time her fingers catch on the hem of your robes, but before she can yank you in you wrench yourself away.

 

“How fortunate, in that case, that I put a dagger in this one.”

 

Her eyes widen with fury. “Get back here, you-!”

 

You dart up the grand staircase, back in the direction of the portrait, which pales in comparison to the genuine article in pursuit.

 

You reach the top step. Your eyes meet those of the portrait and you come to an abrupt stop.

 

You turn in time to be slammed into a wall, yet you put up no fight.

 

“You will tell me how you survived.” She has one hand pressed to your chest over the symbol that had caused you so much trouble. “So I can avoid the same issues when I rip you apart. Tell me, or Rose…”

 

“I forgot to thank you,” you reply, voice distracted and distant. “For saving her.”

 

The pressure pushing against you lessens for a moment as her muscles slacken with confusion. “Thank…?”

 

“Yes.” Your voice is low as it struggles to escape your throat. “Even if her injuries were done by your hand, and Rose’s preservation was only to further your own means… It’s appreciated.”

 

Her grip tightens again. “Stop it.”

 

“No,” you reply, voice turning harsh. “This has been a _long time_ coming.”

 

“Fight back!” she orders, voice growing louder. “Why aren’t you fighting back?!”

 

“There’s so much I understand now that I did not before.” Your voice softens once more, gaze turning pitiful. “Your whole life you were raised to hate my kind, to kill us. A lifetime of watching the worst of my kind desecrate and destroy, it twisted you. Even though the part of you fighting for good and for those you loved survived, it was buried deep.”

 

She strikes you hard enough to make your head slam back against the wall. “Answer me!”

 

You spit blood, yet still you continue. “You and I did terrible things. But that isn’t who we are.”

 

She strikes again. “ANSWER.”

 

“And in a century of remorse, I don’t believe I apologised to you, not once. Neither did you, but I suppose that’s the difference between us. I’m sorry for my actions.” Through her next hit you barely break eye contact despite the pain bleeding across your skin, as you search, hopelessly, for any sign that your words are reaching the creature within. “I doubt there’s enough left of you here for that.”

 

The eyes that meet yours are blank with fury, uncomprehending.

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“I don’t have to listen to this!” She draws her fist back once more.

 

“No, you don’t. So, stop.”

 

The fist freezes, mid-air. She turns to look at it as though it were not part of her. “What?”

 

“Lower your arm.”

 

The arm drops to her side, motionless.

 

“How?”

 

“Curses of the heart are so strange. You placed one over the heart in my body to control me. You never considered the consequences of returning it to its owner.”

 

Her eyes widen in panic as realisation dawns.

 

“So, if you place a curse on Rose’s heart in my body, and someone switches that heart back into _her_ body… which _you’re_ possessing…”

 

"The hearts have been switched. The curse has reversed,” she whispers.

 

You smile. “This comes as much to my surprise as it does to yours when I say that more than one spell has been reversed tonight.”

 

"It... doesn't make sense..." She shakes her head. “How? Who switched them back?!”

 

“You did. And now,” You take her hand and remove it from your chest. “It’s time for you to sleep.” You catch her before she can hit the floor, and she has never felt smaller in your arms.

 

Rose’s hear beats quiet and steady within her chest as the last remains of her ancestor slip away into nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right I /think/ I fixed all the plot holes but if not then the answer to anything I didn't think of is magic. /Whoosh/.  
> One chapter to go, mostly epilogue-type content.  
> Hope you enjoyed!


	16. The End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You never imagined life could be like this.

Rose cries when she awakens, holds you tight and nuzzles into your hair as though unable to convince herself that you’re both really there, both safe and living. She insists upon tending to your wounds, pressing a cold washcloth to the bruises forming around your face and jaw. She presses her hand against the beating heart in your chest, asks you a thousand questions – none of which you can answer with any certainty. Her ancestor didn’t just return you to this world, she returned you to _life_. It’s a lot to think about, but for now it’s enough to have Rose’s company, to watch her eyes sparkle as they skate across your face.

 

Your heart may be back in your chest, yet it remains, undoubtedly, hers.

 

Your chest is still marked from the curse placed upon it, but the magic evaporated along with the woman who created it. You spend a long time examining it in the mirror, along with every other inch of the reflection you are still growing accustomed to.

 

For the first time in over a century, you're free.

 

Hopefully, she is too.

 

You pass the suits of armour often. They roam the corridors, under nobody’s control but their own, although if they have any particular purpose in doing so, it’s beyond you. If they bear any resentment for the years of enchantment, they give no indication. You feel safe enough to leave them to their own devices, and they, in return, leave you to yours. When you find your study dusted, a vase filled with flowers from the garden sat upon the mantelpiece, you smile, but do not question it.

 

Rose’s “rescue party” turns up on your doorstep several days later, an assortment of soldiers with broken spears and dented armour. Their stories are muddled and incomprehensible, but from what you can gather the forest has not been kind to them.

 

Rose’s betrothed is friendly enough, although you can’t help but behave a little coldly, at least at first. Rose’s arm stays linked through yours as she tells him her story, as she gently explains that, as much as she appreciates the gesture, a rescue party is entirely unnecessary. She’s here of her own free will, and there is nothing present that she cannot handle herself.

 

His eyes flicker to you as she says this, and you smile, showing perhaps a few more teeth than is strictly necessary in the process.

 

You allow the group a few days to recuperate before Rose politely sends them on their way, promising to send word to her mother should any issue arise.

 

Living is not as you remember it. Eating, sleeping, breathing – there are a million things to readjust to. You feel lighter, as though you’re drifting, but Rose is always there to keep you from floating into oblivion. You watch the sun rise from the East balcony, gripping Rose’s hand tight with a terror you have yet to vanquish, petrified as the warm rays slide towards you and across your skin. It’ll be some time before you can appreciate the beauty of the sun-drenched valley and the sun emerging from behind the distant mountains, but when you can watch the dawn without terror clenching at your throat you’ll find it’s the most beautiful sight you’ve ever seen.

 

No. _Second_ most beautiful.

 

You can’t remember the last time Rose wasn’t at your side. You don’t particularly want to, either.

 

If her family, her circumstances, her obligations still concern her, it’s impossible to know. They certainly concern you.

 

“I have a present for you.”

 

She looks up from the piles of books scattered around her, a smile springing to life across her face. The library curtains are pulled all the way back, framing her in the soft glow of midday as a slight breeze from the open windows plays with her hair. “Kanaya. You shouldn’t have.”

 

“It’s nothing.” You may be blushing. “Really.” You join her at her table, chosen from the half-a-dozen or so furnishing your library as the sturdiest for supporting the stacks of heavy tomes Rose has dug out and lost herself in. You perch yourself on the edge, smiling down as she leans back in her seat to look up at you.

 

“Kanaya. The torture is truly exquisite. Please, save me from my agonising misery before I expire from anticipation.”

 

“Close your eyes,” you reply, failing to keep the laughter from your voice. Rose scrunches up her eyes, nose crinkling, and you shake your head. “ _Properly_ , Rose!”

 

“Fine, fine!” She laughs, places one hand over her eyes and holds the other out before her. As soon as the metal makes contact with her palm her eyes fly open. She glances up at you, eyes questioning, before returning her attention to the object in her hand. “Why, Kanaya, if I didn’t know better I would say it was a set of keys.”

 

You incline your head. “There is no match for your powers of observation.”

 

Rose shakes her head. “As much I would love to spend the rest of the day trading flippant remarks, I’d love an explanation far more.”

 

You smile, look down at your feet. “The castle. They’re the keys to every door in the castle.”

 

Rose’s expression is a beautiful mix of amusement and incredulity. “Kanaya, you should know by now that a locked door is no match for me.”

 

“Of course not. I was making a… symbolic gesture.”

 

“A symbolic…” she trails off. “The castle?”

 

“I think it’s time that this place returned to its rightful inheritor, don’t you?”

 

She stands, closing the distance between you. “Kanaya… this is too much.”

 

You take her free hand and place it over the rusty set of keys in her palm. “It could never be enough.”

 

Rose shakes her head. “I won’t take your home from you.”

 

“This was never my home.” You raise your head, eyes flickering across the towering stacks and elegant arches to which you have become so accustomed. “I’ve spent far too much time pretending it was. Besides, you need it far more.” You squeeze her hand.

 

Rose’s eyes narrow. “What? So you’re leaving?”

 

"I..." It’s your turn to trail off as your mouth dries. “I’m sure I’ll find something to do with myself.”

 

Rose’s eyes narrow further, lips pinching together. “Oh, _will you now_.”

 

You draw yourself up, sliding from the edge of the desk to reach your full height. “Y-Yes! I suppose I shall!”

 

“Well, if you want my honest opinion, I think that’s a terrible idea!”

 

You snort. “Then what would you suggest, Miss Lalonde?”

 

“You should marry me instead.” She turns her nose up in the air haughtily. “ _Obviously_.”

 

“Ah.” It’s hard to be sure, but your brain may have just fallen out of the back of your head.

 

Rose's haughty expression falls away as a faint blush steals across her cheeks. She clears her throat. “I believe in these situations, some kind of answer is customary.”

 

“Ah, yes,” you say vaguely, before your mind catches up with the rest of you. “I mean, yes! Yes, yes!” Rose squeals in delight as your hands slide around her waist and lift her into the air, and the keys fall to the ground with a clatter. “Yes, Rose Lalonde, a thousand times yes!”

 

By the time you return her to solid ground her hands have found your face, and her lips are quick to follow as they press against your own. It’s like being bathed in sunlight from top to bottom, filled with light and love.

 

The air around you fizzes with energy, and several loud pops draw the pair of you from your embrace as flashes of purple flash and sizzle across the room. Rose giggles, and they hum and pulse in rhythm with her voice. “I may have gotten, ah, a little excited.”

 

You smile in return, and when your lips meet again the room is bathed in gold and purple, light and laughter filing the space between you.

 

Brightest of all is the girl before you, and as you pull her close you can feel her heart within her chest, the rhythm beating in perfect time with your own.

 

Her heart and yours, together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow hey would u look at that  
> the fluff ending nobody expected
> 
> Thank you so much for reading. I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I did writing!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, please let me know what you thought!  
> ~carcats.tumblr.com~


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